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A 




HOVELS! 


By Mrs. J. H. WALWORTH. 


Author of “True to Herself,” “The New Man at Rossmere,” “Without 
Blemish,” “Southern Silhouettes,” etc., etc. 



7 Price, 2y Cents. 

• 


PUBl.lSHED MONTHLY. 


Yearly %y.oo. November, i8^. 

EnUretl atth*; V**w Ottice M *ccoud-oiM» 





I 


TtLE-MANHATTAN-5ER,lE5 

OF 

Popular American Copyright Novels. 

Published Monthly. Yearly Subscription $3.00. Single Copy 25 cents. 


Every one desiring to read really good novels, written by 
popular American authors, should not fail to get the stories in the 
following list. In the “Manhattan Series” these novels are 
issued in neat, attractive book form, printed from large, clear 
type, at a price as cheap or cheaper than the reprints of cheap 
English novels. These stories have been selected for their in- 
tense dramatic interest, vigor and movement of action, absorbing 
fascination of plot and mystery, and the wide popularity of the 
authors. 

The Following Titles are Now Ready: 

THE MIDNIGHT MARRIAGE. 

By Amanda M. Douglas. 

MARRIED IN MASK. 

By Mansfield Tracy Walworth. 

THE DAUGHTER OF THE REGIMENT. 

By Mary A. Denison. 

TRIXY ; or, The Shadow of a Crime. 

By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon. 


TRUE TO HERSELF. 


By Mrs. J. H. Walworth. 


THE FACE OF ROSENFEL. 

By Charles Howard Montague. 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 

By Mrs. J. H. Walworth. 


The above are for sale at all Book-Stores and by Newsdealers^ or will 
be sent fost-paid on receipt of price {2^ cents per copy), by the publisher, 

4 . BURT^ 56 BeekmQn St, Nm York, 


A NOVEL. 


/ 

By MRS. J. H. WALWORTH, 

Author of 



“True to Herself,” “The Bar Sinister,” The New Man at Rossmere,” 
“Without Blemish,” “Old Fulkerson’s Clerk,” etc., etc. 



NEW YORK: 

A. L. BURT, PUBLISHER. 


Copyright 1888 , by A. L. Burt. 


THE BEN-FRANKLIN PRESS, 
46 TO 61 ROSE ST., 
NEW YORK. 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


CHAPTER I. 


A FATAL PROCRASTINATION. 


PS. MIRWIH, of Ho. — Spruce Street, Phila- 



-tVX delphia, kept rooms for ‘‘gentlemen only.” 
In the morning, when, after breakfast — a meal some- 
what diffusive in point of time — all the great-coats 
and hats disappeared from the rack in the hall, her 
soul reveled in the soothing reflection that the house 
was absolutely and exclusively her own until flve 
o’clock should bring the very earliest of her lodgers 
home to dinner. She quite plumed herself upon the 
success of the placard that had been the means of 
halting every petticoated room-hunter out there on 
the sidewalk, sending them away with disgusted disap- 
pointment visibly outlined on their countenances. 

Hot that Mrs. Mirwin’s for “gentlemen only” in- 
dicated an inferior class of stopping-place. On the 
contrary, it was because of its unexceptionable loca- 
tion ; its outside suggestions of indoor elegance ; its 
tantalizing glimpses of jars and plaques, and things 
that women only could appreciate, that the tabooed 


6 


A STBAmJEJ PILGRIMAGE, 


sex turned aAvay, with such a sense of personal in- 
jury, from the doors that were sealed to them. That 
rude placard was a block of stumbling and an of- 
fence to them. As if, they bitterly argued, there 
could be any conceivable spot on earth that woman 
could not fill more satisfactorily than men. 

Mrs. Mirwin’s own explanation of her partiality 
for the male sex bore hardly upon her sisters : She 
had not been starving at boarding-house keeping for 
sixteen years without learning something, and if 
ever she did open her doors to a lot of women, who 
didn’t have a blessed thing to do but to gossip about 
each other and back-bite her, she hoped some kind 
friend would get out a certificate of lunacy and 
have her confined as incompetent to care for 
herself.” There was another thing : Men never 

came down from her best first-floor front, in seal- 
skin jackets, to make a row about the price of coal 
and insist upon having fifty cents struck from their 
bills. Women loved to haggle; men didn’t.” 

But the illuminated vision of a house full of men, 
who neither gossiped about each other, nor grumbled 
over their food, nor haggled about prices, but 
promptly effaced themselves immediately after 
breakfast, had its obverse side, as all illuminations 
have. And as the obverse was usually shown about 
the time that Mrs. Mirwin, weary and worn with 
her day’s exertions in behalf of omnivorous feeders, 
most devoutly desired, in her turn, to efface herself, 


A STBAIf'GE PILGRIMAGE. 


7 


it bore somewhat hardly upon her, and forced her 
to acknowledge that there was something to be said 
in favor of women, after all. 

If she could have filled her rooms with a lot of 
sublunary angels in trowsers, who would have gone 
as promptly to bed after their six o’clock dinners as 
they did to their offices after an eight o’clock break- 
fast, Mrs. Mir win’s idyllic dream of carrying on a 
boarding-house painlessly might have been realized. 
As it was 

Well, as it was, Mrs. Mirwin looked at her clock 
and yawned. She had been looking at her clock 
and yawning, alternately, for four mortal hours ; 
that is, from seven o’clock p. m. until eleven o’clock 
p. M., without extracting either comment or sympa- 
thy from any one but herself, for the sufficient rea- 
son that she was entirely alone in the gloomy mid- 
dle-room, that was sandwiched between the front 
parlor and the “ back extension.” 

This middle-room, being windowless and stuffy, 
Mrs. Mirwin, for economic reasons, retained it for 
her own boudoir. 

On the evening in question nature occasionally so 
far asserted herself as to cause Mrs. Mirwin’s 
weary head to drop on her plump bosom in unrest- 
ful slumber, and to extort from the poor lady’s nos- 
trils an audible protest against this rending of the 
hours of repose from their legitimate use. But these 
periods of semi-unconsciousness were brief, and 


8 


A STEAJYGF PILGRIMAGE. 


always terminated in Mrs. Mirwin’s sitting rigidly up- 
right in her chair, after casting a look of bitter re- 
proach up at the ceiling over her head, through 
which descended the muffled sound of several pairs 
of restless feet — a heartless sort of shuffling, quite 
as if the owners of half a dozen pairs of shoes were 
bent upon trampling on propriety and on Mrs. Mir- 
win’s feelings at one and the same time. 

‘‘ They surely are making a night of it,” said that 
weary lady, punctuating her sentence with yawns, 
and wiping the tears extracted thereby from her 
drowsy eyes with the Avoolly surface of an unfinished 
afghan she carried about with her, as a sort of port- 
able advertisement of her own tireless energy. 
“Maybe, if they had to pay the gas bills, they 
wouldn’t be so spry near on to midnight. If I left 
it to that creature down stairs, we’d all be asphyxi- 
ated before morning. I suppose I’ve got to set it 
out if it lasts all night. Mercy! There ain’t no 
more of them to come at this hour of night !” 

This latter clause, ejaculated in an intensely wide- 
awake voice, was occasioned by a sharp pull at the 
front door-gong, which sounded preternaturally 
harsh at that still hour of the night. Mrs. Mirwin 
transferred herself from the depths of her easy- 
chair to the door of her stuffy apartment with as- 
tonishing celerity, avoirdupois and previous condi- 
tion considered. 

Henry, the waiter, alluded to above as “ that cre^- 


A SridASGU PITMRIMAG]^. 


9 


ture,^^ emerged from the lower hall just as Mrs. Mir- 
win emerged from her den. The towzled condition 
of his head, and the dissolute look of his neck-tie, 
suggested surreptitious slumbers. He shuffled to- 
ward the front door with a general air of disgust 
pervading his person. 

How many of ’em’s up there now, Henry the 
disgusted landlady asked of her disgusted servitor. 

“Four!” 

Henry was laconic. The man at the gong was 
impatient. He rang a second time during that brief 
colloquy, a proceeding which had the effect of mak- 
ing Henry drag his slippered feet yet a little more 
deliberately toward the vestibule. 

“ I guess you’ll git in when I open the door, and 
no sooner. I ain’t used to settin’up all night, and I 
don’t care to git used to it, neither.” 

“ All night !” Mrs. Mirwin veered mendaciously. 
“It’s only a few minutes past eleven. You are a 
regular sleepy-head. If I don’t mind it why should 
you ?” 

But the door was open by that time, and the uni- 
form of a telegraph messenger gleamed out of the 
dark vestibule. A telegram and a book were thrust 
into Henry’s face — “For Mr. Archibald Murray; 
sign there.” 

Henry “ signed there,” and once more consigned 
the uniformed messenger to outer darkness. Mrs. 
Mirwin advanced as far as the hall-lamp and 


10 


A STBAisrajiJ pilorimaoe. 


promptly possessed lierself of the dingy envelope. 
There is an ineradicable sense of excitement associ- 
ated with a telegram, greater then than now, for 
the date of that telegram and of Mrs. Mirwin’s 
perturbation was before the war, when telegrams 
were not the commercial things, of course, they have 
become since. 

“ For Mr. Murray ! And a night message at that ! 
Poor dear, young man !” 

Flight messages is half rates,” Henry suggested 
practically, waiting with impersonal patience to have 
the telegram handed back. 

“ That’s true. Guess it’s not so dreadful, after all. 
Take it up at once, Henry. Maybe it will start 
them anyhow.” 

Having extracted all the satisfaction possible from 
a repeated perusal of Mr. Murray’s name on the 
back of the sealed envelope, she handed it back to 
Henry, who proceeded immediately up-stairs with it. 
She was prepared to draw on her sympathies at 
sight to any reasonable extent. She remained in the 
hall below in a condition of keen alertness. In case 
the telegram should prove to be of a distressing 
character it would be altogether proper for her to 
offer that advice and assistance that only women 
know how to offer under distressful circumstances. 

Particularly in young Murray’s case. He had 
been boarding with her now for nearly six years. 
Ever since that rich old Yirginia uncle of his had 


A STEAJSTGE PILOEIMAOE. 


11 


brought him to Philadelphia to study medicine and 
had told her, with such frank confidence, that he 
was all the boy had left in the world ” and he 
meant to do a good part by him,’’ old Mr. Dabney 
always stopped with her himself, when he came on 
to see Archibald. In fact, was not above sitting in 
the front parlor a little while after meals to chat. 
He had said nice things to her, too, about herself 
individually, when no one was nigh — things that 
elderly and lonely women set a good deal more store 
by and remember much longer than younger women, 
to whom compliments are no rarity. She liked old 
Mr. Dabney better than any transient ” she had 
ever taken in. That was one reason why she felt 
so solemnly obhged to hold herself in readiness to 
pour out on this kinless youth — provided, of course, 
the telegram should prove to be of the bereaving 
sort — all the pent-up tenderness of her unappropri- 
ated heart. 

She was impatient for Henry to come back down 
stairs, and at least inform her how the poor, dear 
young man looked when he tore open the fatal 
envelope. It was a severe trial to her already 
severely tried nerves to hear Henry finally shuffle 
into the hall above, from the first-floor front, and to 
see hun slowly loom in sight, swinging an empty 
pitcher recklessly by the handle, looking as stolidly 
unconcerned as if he had been expressly engaged by 
the week to attend to midnight telegrams. She 


12 


A STBAJ^GjE^ pilobimaoe. 


could scarcely wait for his shuffling feet to reach the 
lower hall, before asking eagerly : 

“ What did he say, Henry 

He say, fetch up some more ice-water,” said 
Henry, grinning broadly and maliciously. 

But how did he look, Henry ?” 

Like he’d had more’n enough,” said Henry, clat- 
tering past her in- the direction of the refrigerator, 
spurred into activity by the sharp tinkling of Mr. 
Murray’s room-bell. 

Preposterous !” Mrs. Mirwin vented some of 
her long pent-up indignation in that vague exclama- 
tion, and walked back toward the ill-ventilated, 
stuffy middle-room, only to emerge again, however, 
when Henry, having temporarily satisfied the revel- 
lers up-stairs, was once more on his way to the base- 
ment. 

Ho signs of breaking up yet, Henry ?” 

They’s about taperin’ off. Mr. Clayton, he’s got 
as fur as lookin’ at his watch.” 

“ Who else is there ?” 

Mr. Markam and Mr. Gordon. The same old 
lot.” 

Having imparted this information, Henry pursued 
his downward journey, bent, perhaps, on snatching 
forty winks before the night was irreparably spent. 

“ ^ The same old lot !’ I should say so. I’m glad 
he’s not my son, or he would have to give up that 
same old lot, Bollicking, frohcking Southerners. 


A STRAJSTGE PILGRIMAGE. 


13 


At least it’s my privilege to see that they don’t 
set fire to the house a-lighting of their cigars when 
they do go out.” 

In the exercise of this privilege, Mrs. Mirwin 
opened the front parlor-door and seating herself con- 
spicuously in view of the hall stairway, assumed an 
expression of countenance and an attitude in which 
fatigue and disgust were finely blended. She was 
rapidly waxing wroth at this unprecedented pro- 
ceeding on the part of her first-fioor front.” She 
knew, as well as any of them could tell her, that 
young Murray had received his license to practice 
medicine that very day, and that the other three,” 
as the remaining criminals were frequently desig- 
nated, had come there, as they called it, to sit up 
with him. She didn’t know that she was called to 
sit up with him too, though.” The door to the first- 
floor front opened : 

‘^That’s Clayton!” She sat bolt upright, as a 
light foot fall was heard on the softly-carpeted stairs, 
and the first of the departing revelers came into 
view. I’d say something cross, but he was looking 
at the third-story back the last time he was here, and 
I’d like to secure him. (Mrs. Mirwin was not without 
her own well-defined policy in life.) Handsome fel- 
loAv. I’d like the neighbors to see that tile of his 
coming in and going out. It looks prosperous.” Mr. 
Clayton passed out unchallenged. Close behind 
him came Gordon and Markham, The seediest of 


14 


A SmAJ^GB PILGRIMAGE. 


the lot, Mrs. Mirwin said to herself and stepping to 
the door, she greeted them with a frigid ‘‘good- 
morning, gentlemen.’’ 

“ Oh, not so bad as that. Look at your watch, 
Gordon. Sorry to keep you up so late, Mrs. Mir- 
win, but it was a solemn occasion for Archie. Had 
to see him through, you know.” 

Mr. Markham’s utterance was a trifle flannelly, 
and his laugh was a disjointed affair, but he got 
into his overcoat without any conspicuous signs of 
failure. 

Mrs. Mirwin’s attention was diverted by the word 
“ solemn.” 

“ You mean the telegram ! Nothing very bad, I 
hope.” 

“ Tel-gram ! Did we get tel-gram ? To-be-sure. 
Don’t know what wassin tel-gram. Congratu — con- 

grat — con .” Mr. Gordon gave it up in despair. 

“From Unc — Dab — s’pose. Good-night, Mrs. Mir- 
w’n. Better boy next time.” 

They were all gone, and a death-like silence had 
fallen upon the room up-stairs. There was no use 
waiting up any longer. 

Mrs. Mirwin finally retired to the stuffy middle- 
room, with a weight of ungratified curiosity resting 
upon her like an incipient nightmare, and her mind 
in a sadly unsettled condition touching the superior 
advantages of “ gentlemen only ” as boarders, over 
the female sex, 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


15 


She should certainly speak to Mr. Murray — “ Doc- 
tor Murray,” she supposed she must train her tongue 
to now — very freely in the morning. If it wasn’t 
for dear Mr. Dabney she did not know how plain 
her speech might become. 

It was a crumpled piece of yellow paper lying on 
the rug at the foot of the stairs that first recalled 
Doctor Murray to her mind the next morning. She 
pounced upon it, and read it without the slightest 
compunction. It was that telegram. Evidently, 
she concluded, dropped from some of his pockets 
when Henry had taken his clothes down stairs to 
brush. Having read and re-read it, she marveled 
more than ever at the peculiar reception it had met 
with. She laid the rumpled bit of paper on the 
newel-post and smoothed every crease out of it. By 
the time this was done to her satisfaction, she had 
quite settled in her own mind what disposition she 
would make of it. She would lay it on his plate, 
under his morning’s mail. He really was not en- 
titled to any further consideration. 

During the smoothing process Mrs. Mirwin had 
made several unsuccessful efforts to recall some lines 
that she had read somewhere, she really could not 
say where, about serpent’s teeth and children and 
an old king. She was quite sure they would fit in 
here and furnish her with a telling quotation, if only 
she could get at them right end foremost. But 
somehow, aU Mrs. Mirwin’s bits of prose — and she 


16 


A srHAmiJ PILORTMAOB. 


kept a sort of job-lot on hand — had a spiteful trick 
of presenting their wrong end foremost. 

Young Murray was actually in his place at the table 
before she found her cue, so she had to relinquish 
all hope of flaying him Avith a classical scourge. He 
looked a trifle the Avorse for Avear that morning, but 
it AA^as a handsome young face, brimful of hope and 
energy, upon AAdiich Mrs. MirAvin kept a furti\"e 
AA^atch oA^er the lid of her Heclar coffee-pot. 

It seemed aJong time before he reached the tele- 
gram. A lot of letters had come for him that morn- 
ing. When he did, he turned it OA^er inquisitiveljq 
but indifferently. Head it — and caught his breath 
AAdth a gasp. First a violent suffusion of blood, 
crimsoning cheek, temple and broAV ; then a death- 
like settled pallor, and such a look of torture in the 
Avide-open eyes that Mrs. MirAvin repented heartily 
of her unkind ruse. 

“ Why, Avhere did this come from ?” he gasped. 
‘AVhere’s the envelope? Hoav did it get here?” 
striking his plate violently Avitli the open paper. 

It came last night, and Avas sent straight up to 
your room. I suppose it must haA^e dropped out of 
your pocket this morning AA^hen Henry took your 
clothes doAvn. I hope nothing’s Avrong AAuth Mr. 
Dabney ?” 

“ Did I make such a beast of myself as that ?” he 
said, looking at her Avith absent gaze. “ Uncle dying 
and I carousing !” 


A BfRANOS PlLoniMAGK. 


\1 

Mrs. Mirwin’s rigidly compressed lips conveyed 
the idea, that, all the remarkable circumstances con- 
sidered, she had no consolation to offer. 

I just saw the word ^ Eichmond,’ ” the young 
man added in frank self-abasement, and thought it 
was a congratulation from the old gentleman. Told 
the boys so, and thrust it into my pocket.” 

Hereafter,” said Mrs. Mirwin, passing him his 
coffee with judicial severity of countenance, 
would advise you to read telegrams. People don’t 
go to the trouble of sending ’em, I reckon, unless 
they’ve got something in them. Trouble and ex- 
pense.” 

God only knows what this delay may have cost 
me,” her victim said, gulping down the steaming 
coffee in reckless haste. 

suppose the old gentleman’s will is made, 
and ” 

“ Is that the sort of brute you take me for ?” 

He pushed his chair back violently and rushed out 
of the room. In half an hour’s time Mrs. Mirwin 
caught a fleeting glimpse of him as he sprang into 
the cab Henry had been sent out for, with his trav- 
eling-bag in his hand. 

“ Henry,” said Mrs. Mirwin solemnly, as they to- 
gether stood on the stoop and looked after the swift- 
moving vehicle, I want you to take warning by 
that poor young man. It’s as good as reading a 
temperance tract. If he has lost his uncle’s fortune, 


18 


A PILGRIMAGE. 


it’s all because of that orgie last night. Remember 
that all your life, Henry.” 

‘‘You’re ’ard on the doctor,” said Henry, whose 
palm was still closed about the generous tip flung at 
him by Archie. “’Twarn’t so bad as all that ; just 
two bottles, or maybe three, of champagne. That’s 
a lot that never forgets they’s gentlemen.” 

“ Gentlemen or not gentlemen ; forget or not for- 
get, do you remember this day’s lesson, Henry.” 

“ I will, mum, and when I hears my rich uncle is 
falling into bad ’ealth, I will be particular abstemi- 
ous ; I will indeed, mum.” 

In a desultory way Mrs. Mirwin was a participant 
in the temperance movement, and Henry, the only 
subservient male about the premises, got the full 
benefit of all her theories. 


A PILGBIMAQE, 


19 


CHAPTEE II, 


THE NEW DYNASTY. 



‘HE YELLOW sunlight that came slanting 


through the leafless branches of the trees on 
the lawn were not real sunbeams ! The emeralds 
and rubies and diamonds that flashed into being 
from every blade of grass on which they fell were 
not real dew-drops ! The wet rose-leaves that had 
fallen from the sweet-smelling, old-fashioned, late- 
blooming “ cabbage-rose,” and strewn one end of the 
gallery floor with big pink petals, were not real 
rose-leaves ! The white and yellow chrysanthemums 
set in prim alternate rows all around the graveled 
carriage circle, were not real flowers ! Hothing was 
real but death and ingratitude and remorse and that 
motionless figure lying in the parlor behind the 
closed shutters in the old Dabney mansion. 

y es, Brander was real. Eeal in his huge shaggy 
personality and in his ability to express dumb sym- 
pathy. It was with unhurrying dignity that 
Brander stalked around the corner of the house, 
leaving the impress of each huge paw on the wet 
gallery, and came sedately to a stand-still by Archi- 
bald Murray, where he stood looking wistfully out on 


20 


A STBAJVai/ FIZG^IMAG^J^. 


a landscape so full of peace and serenity that it 
seemed a mockery on that particular morning. 
Brander sighed, laid his black muzzle on the young 
man’s hand and said with his soft, brown eyes: “ We 
Avill both miss him.” 

“Yes, we’re left alone, old boy, but you’ve got 
nothing on your conscience I have. Suppose we 
take a tramp together.” 

A window was suddenly thrown up at the remote 
end of the long gallery. A small, eager face and 
the upper portion of a half -clad form were thrust 
into view. A shrill, childish voice broke the silence. 

“ Say I mother says I may have that dog now. 
What’s his name, I want to know ?” 

The boy suffered sudden eclipse. A slim, white 
hand had drawn him backward violently and 
dropped the window-curtain in front of him. 

“ A member of the new dynasty, Brander. I had 
almost forgotten they were here. Come, let us tone 
up for the ordeal.” 

Brander needed no second invitation. It necessi- 
tated a brisk dog-trot on his part to keep up with the 
long, swinging steps that soon carried his restless 
master beyond the dew-spangled lawn into the lane 
that led to the open fields. Archibald drank in the 
pure, sweet morning air in great gulps. It braced 
him with a sense of refreshment. The night just 
gone had been to him as the vigil of the young 
’squire on the eve of knighthood. If he had not 


yi SmylJVGB PILGj^IMAGM 


21 


exactly watched his arms with prayer and fasting, 
he had been girding up his loins to bear with dig- 
nity the inevitable, which, in his case, had come in 
shape of a most stupendous surprise. It was as if 
the solid earth had suddenly been cut away from 
under his feet, and there was nothing left him to 
stand on while he tried to make a fresh start in 
hfe. 

The stables stood at the end of the lane. Bran- 
der looked at him inquiringly when he swerved to 
the right before reaching them, and threw one leg 
over the low bars that led into the tobacco-patches. 
It was contrary to Brander’s recollection that young 
Murray had ever come home, even since he had got- 
ten to be a long-limbed young medical student, Avith- 
out promptly paying his respects to Billy Barlow, 
the shaggy little pony, upon Avhich he had careened 
over the country, as happy as any lord, since first 
his short legs could reach the stirrups. He saw the 
rebuke in Brander’s eyes, and changing his route, 
reached the stable-lot just in time to see Billy Bar- 
low ridden forth in triumph by a boy of fourteen 
years old, who grinned tauntingly at a smaller boy 
who ran alongside, grasping frantically at the bridle- 
rein, Avhile he vented his Avrath in high-pitched 
tones : 

Mother said I might have the first ride, and I’m 
going back to the house and tell Hetty ^bout your 
goin’s on. Hetty said it was aAvful for you to be 


22 


A STBAJV'GJ^ PILGRIMAOE. 


cuttin’ up so before Uncle Dick was buried. You 
know she did.” 

I don’t care what you, nor Hetty, neither, says. 
I’m riding this pony.” 

The triumphant ^ider laughed mockingly, brought 
the whip down on the clinging fingers that retarded 
his progress, plunged his heels into astonished Billy’s 
flanks and galloped out of sight. 

Some more of the reigning dynasty, Brander.” 

They were close to the defeated boy by this time. 
He stood rubbing his knuckles and glaring sullenly 
after Billy’s receding form. 

‘‘What is your name, my man?” Archie asked, 
not unkindly. Why should he visit the decree of 
fate on a child’s head ? 

“ My name’s Dick Ogden. What’s yours ?” 

“ Mine is Archibald Murray.” 

“Oh! You’re Uncle Dick’s nephew. You used 
to live here. It’s our place now. Hetty says we 
ought to call 3^ou cousin. Ma says she don’t know 
about that, yet. I expect I’m going to have a row 
with Lem every time I Avant to ride our pony. It’s 
our pony noAV. Everything’s ours that used to be- 
long to Uncle Dick. Ma said I might have the first 
ride on him, ’cause I’m delicate, you knoAA^, and have 
to exercise, you see.” 

“ Hoav many of you are there ?” Archie asked. 

“ Hoav many of Avhich ?” 

“ Children.” 


A PlLOBIMAGE. 23 

He would like to have said invaders, or imps, or 
something of that sort. 

There ain’t none of us children. There’s Lem 
and me and Tad and Hetty, but she don’t count.” 

“ Why don’t she count 

“ She’s only a girl.” 

“ Which is the oldest ?” 

“ Hetty. That’s the reason she puts on so many 
airs, and tries so hard to boss us. But she’s got her 
hands full when she tries to regulate me and Lem.” 

How does she try to regulate you and Lem ?” 
Archibald was conscious of a growing interest in the 
family history of his successors. This boy struck 
him as rather a unique specimen. “ What sort of 
airs does Hetty put on ?” 

Oh, bother ! I don’t know. She’s always fussin’ 
at us, and tellin’ us this ain’t right and that’s all 
wrong, and she don’t let a fellow have any peace of 
his life, if he’s doing anything she don’t think 
proper. Ma’s a heap easier on us than Hetty is. 
Hetty says she wants us to be gentlemen, but I 
reckon she’ll have to let us grow up to that ; don’t 
you ?” 

I don’t know, ’’said Archie, smiling down into the 
small, inquisitive face before him ; ‘Ot is possible for 
a very small boy to be a gentleman.” 

“That’s just what Hetty’s always dinging into 
us. But Hetty’s got her head mighty full of rub- 
bishy notions. That’s a bully big dog, ain’t he ? 


24 


A PlLGRtMAGm. 


What’s his name ? Ma told Tad he might have the 
dog, ’cause, you see, he’s too little to ride on our 
pony.” 

The gloom came back into Archie’s face at this 
reminder of his own helplessness, and he turned 
sharply away from the boy without answering his 
last batch of inquiries. An indignant rebuke was 
hurled after him as he walked rapidly away. 

“ If that’s the sorter cross-patch you are, I’m go- 
ing to tell ma she needn’t keep you on here for a 
teacher for me and Lem. I, for one, won’t go to 
school to you.” 

That then was the destiny that had been so offi- 
ciously and promptly mapped out for him. His 
cheeks flushed hotly, and his soul seemed steeped 
in gall. He quickened his pace and walked on and 
on, in a frenzied effort to outstrip his own fast rising 
indignation. It made no difference whitherward, nor 
how far. The necessity for violent motion was upon 
him. On and on, leaping ditches, climbing fences, 
parting with reckless hands the brambly growths 
that impeded his progress, until, with the drops of 
physical exhaustion bedewing his forehead, he found 
himself slowly retracing his steps toward the house 
by way of the river-bank. He would pay one more 
visit to the little wooden bench under the oak-tree, 
that grew out on a tiny promontory. The neigbors 
called it Dabney’s Lookout.” 

He was in the immediate proximity of the bench 


A SmAWGB PILGBIMAGE. 


25 


before be discovered that it was already occupied. 
A girl’s straw-hat lay upon one end of it. A girl’s 
slim form occupied the other. She neither saw nor 
heard his approach, for in her arms, that Avere folded 
across the back of the bench, her bared head was 
buried, and convulsive sobs were shaking her slight 
form violently. 

Brander officiously frustrated his master’s kind in- 
tention of retreating unobserved by uttering a low 
groAvl. He evidently recognized this spot as pecul- 
iarly sacred to memory. 

The girl on the bench started to her feet in 
affright ; then blushed furiously under Archie’s 
steady gaze. 

“ This must be my cousin Hetty,” he said, holding 
out his hand and draAving her back to the bench. 

You did not come to breakfast. You must be 
awfully Avorn. I told them to keep it hot for you.” 

Thank you. It Avas good of you even to remem- 
ber my existence. 

She had spoken rapidly and confusedly, Avhile she 
pushed her rumpled hair behind her ears and reached 
for the hat that had fallen from the bench to the 
ground. Archie Avatched her as she tied its ribbons 
under her rounded chin, Avith hands that still trem- 
bled. Tears unshed glistened on her lids. 

“You loved our Uncle so much, then, without ever 
having seen him ?” 

“ I Avas not crying for Uncle Richard. I was cry- 


26 


A STHAJ^GB PILGRIMAGE. 


ing for you some, but for ourselves more.” She said 
this very frankly, with lier truth-telling eyes looking 
wistfully into his. 

For yourselves 

‘^For mother and the boys and myself. I was 
crying to think how impossible it would be for you 
to avoid hating us. I was wishing that I could have 
things all my own way for just this once, so that I 
could make up to you for everything.” 

‘‘What do you mean by making up to me for 
everything ?” 

“ Ah, you must know what I mean !” 

“JSTo; I confess to being very much confused. 
You won’t feel badly if I tell you I had never heard 
of the existence of your family before I got home 
and found you here. Queer, isn’t it ? I suppose I 
will have it all explained after — a little later on.” 

“ If I could only get out of it myself,” she said, 
not looking at him, but fixing her eyes on a point 
far away across the river. Her clasped hands 
twitched nervously. “If I could only run away 
somewhere and not have to stay here at all.” 

“ Don’t you think it a pretty place, then ?” He 
looked mercifully away from her troubled face as he 
went on. “ Eight here I think the view is especially 
lovely. Whenever I was expected home. Uncle 
Dick would come out to this point, and his Panama 
hat and white hair would be about the first thinors 
to greet my eyes when the boat rounded that point 


A SmAlTGB PIZaniMAGR 21 

yonder. What a brute I was not to have gotten 
here in time.’’ 

She put out a comforting hand and laid it silently 
on his arm, but her words were not consolatory. 

“ That is what hurts me worst. Things would 
have been different if you had been here. IN’ow it’s 
all left to the law, and it’s because this is the love- 
liest spot on earth and I know I could be happier 
here than anywhere in the world, that I’m miser- 
able about you. Why should we come into all this, 
just because Uncle Kichard was dilatory. If mamma 
would only do as I beg her to.” 

“ And that is 

“ To go back to Petersburg and leave you in pos- 
session of your own home.” 

Matters seem to have been promptly discussed 
and settled 

Disgracefully so I” she said bitterly. 

“ And Mrs. Ogden’s final decision V’ 

You will hear soon enough.” 

“ Come ; I’d rather hear it all from you. I think 
you will soften it in your manner of telling.” 

“ Oh ! it cannot be softened. It cannot be soft- 
ened by any manner of telling. It makes me wish 
myself entirely out of a world where people can be 
so unjust.” 

She wrung her hands piteously in an excess of 
impatient distress. 

‘‘Nevertheless,” said Archibald gravely, “I 


A smAmB piLGiuMAaR 


think you will consent to explain matters when I 
repeat that I would rather hear it from you than 
any one else. Firstly, I should like to ask why I 
have never heard of my cousin Hetty before ? Why 
I should have remained under the impression all 
these years that my own mother, who brought me 
here when I was about seven years old — she died 
here on that visit — should never have told me about 
an aunt 

“ Mother is not your aunt. She and Uncle 
Hi chard were own brother and sister, but your 
mother was only a step-sister. But Uncle Kichard 
loved his step-sister and hated his own sister. 

“You are sadly well informed about our family 
affairs.” 

“Yes; I know all about it. Mother was very ill 
once and thought she was going to die. It was then 
that she told me all about it. I think it was mother’s 
fault that Uncle Kichard and a lady he loved very 
dearly did not get married. Mother came between 
them. She did not want our uncle to marry at all, 
I suppose. He has never had anything to do with 
her since he found it out. When mother heard he 
was ill, she came on here with all of us, but he did 
not even then let her come into the room. Ho one 
could help knowing that he did not want her to have 
this property. But the law gives it to her. And 
now I don’t want you to agree to what mother is 
going to ask you to do. All this must sound 


A STMAmJE! PILGEIMAGM. 


awfully treacherous, but you just could not stand it, 
and I think I ought to tell you so.” 

“ Stand teaching the boys 

She looked at him in amazement. 

I have seen one of them already this morning,” 
he said explanatorily, down there at the stables. 
I believe I did not make a very good impression 
upon him. He let fall some expressions of dis- 
approval.” 

“ It was Eob ! It must have been Eob !” Her 
cheeks were aflame, and she hung her head until her 
big straw-hat concealed all but one rosy ear from 
his gaze. Don’t try it, please. Don’t, for your 
own sake. They are such terrible children. Eeally 
terrible.” 

“Poor little woman, you are a young care- 
taker.” 

“ I am obliged to, you know,” she said very simply. 
“ They tire mamma, and she depends on me to keep 
them in order. You will hate us all if you try to 
live with us. You just can’t help it.” 

“Hot you, I am sure. I would be a brute, in- 
deed.” 

She gave him a look of flashing indignation. It 
outraged her to have him pay her commonplace 
compliments when she was so horribly in earnest. 
She stood up before him with her small clasped 
hands hanging in front of her. He did not at aU 
understand her. 


A STJiAm^ PILGRIMAaE. 


ao 

“ I am going back to the house now, Cousin 
Archibald. I don’t know whether you are making 
game of me or not. I know it’s not natural for you 
to feel kindly to people who have defrauded you, 
and I have helped defraud you in spite of myself. 
But I would like you not to think of me as one who 
enjoys possessing what is rightfully yours. I wish 
I knew some way of serving you. I would do it so 
gladly. Don’t you believe that much ?” 

She stretched out her hands almost imploringly. 
The big hat fell back and the sunbeams gilded the 
fluffy brown rings on her forehead. Her cheeks 
were flushed with excitement ; her eyes were full of 
petition ; she was very pretty ; he Avas very young ; 
they Avere cousins, you knoAV. It came to him sud- 
denly that kinship conferred some pleasant privileges. 

My dear, dear little cousin 1” He dreAV her close 
to him by the hands she had stretched out to him, 
kissed her daringly, swiftly, repeatedly; dropped 
her hands, and Avith Brander close at his heels, 
passed quickly out of sight, not reckoning on the 
Avaxen nature of a young girl’s heart. 

She stood where he had left her for a long time. 
Long enough, it seemed to her, for all the blood that 
was in her veins to floAv and ebb many times from 
cheek and brow and lips — the lips that had been 
kissed for the first time. The tame osculation that 
brought her lips into dutiful contact with her moth- 
er’s frigid ones morning and night belonged to a 


A STBAjVGIJ pilgrimage. 


31 


different order of caress. The boys — they were of 
that age when they rose superior to any such Aveak 
requirements. Yes, she had been Idssed for the first 
time. With a long, tremulous sigh, she, too, finally 
turned from the leaf-strewn bench, Avith thoughts of 
her mother and the boys and the coming funeral 
coming between her and her blissful reverie. 

A loAv chuckle of triumphant laughter made her 
start nervously. Had any of those terrible boys 
been prying on her ? Had any one seen that daring 
kiss? 

Climbing steeply upward, from the water’s edge 
to the bench on the promontoryj Avas a tangled foot- 
path. A woman had just achieved the ascent. She 
evidently considered it an achievement, for she exe- 
cuted that triumphant chuckle again as she Avalked 
swiftly toward where Hetty stood spell-bound by 
the bench. There was nothing Ausible of her but 
her feet and a pair of burning eyes. The rest of her 
Avas lost in the A'oluminous folds of a black water- 
proof cloak, Avhose hood was drawn up over her 
head. She fixed her glittering eyes on Hetty in sur- 
prise that rapidly merged into anger. 

Who are you, girl ? And Avhat are you doing 
here ? Spying on me, are you ?” 

My name is Hetty Ogden. I couldn’t spy on 
you, because I never heard of you. I cam_e here to 
attend my uncle’s funeral.” 

“ Your — uncle’s — funeral !” Who is dead ?” 


32 


A PILGRIMAGE, 


“Uncle Eichard Dabney. If you live in the 
neighborhood you must have heard it.” 

“ Dead ! Then I’m too late, and I’ll never, never 
get forgiveness. I promised her I’d make it all right, 
and I meant to do it. Yes, I did ! I did ! I did ! I 
told her I’d bring the key and put it into his own 
hand, and I meant to do it. I did ! I did ! I did ! 
Here it is now.” She stretched out her long right 
arm from beneath the cloak. In the skinny pahn of 
her hand lay a tiny key, scarcely as large as an old- 
fashioned watch-key. “ Don’t that prove that I was 
acting fairly. Say, girl ! why don’t you say some- 
thing ? Say something at once !” 

“ It looks like a very little key.” 

She had been commanded to say something, and 
she dare not refuse with those burning eyes fixed 
on her face. She felt that she had made a very 
stupid remark. 

“ It is Mr. Dabney’s property. I want to give it 
back to him. I want to give it to him myself. I 
promised I would. If he’s dead I want to put it in 
his coffin. It belongs to nobody now.” 

“ I can take you to him. Ho one need know it. 
"VYe can slip in the side way.” 

“ Is he all by himself ? Hobody in the house ?” 

The prospect seemed to please her. 

“ There are people in the house, but we may avoid 
them.” 

“ Who’s there ?” 


A stbaj^gb pilgrimage. 


33 


My mother and my cousin, and ” 

Who is your mother ?” 

“ Mr. Dabney’s sister.” 

Agnes Dabney ?” 

^^Yes. That was her name.” 

Agnes Dabney !” It was with a venomous hiss 
she repeated the name. Agnes Dabney up there 
at the house you ask me. to go to !” Her arm was 
raised in malediction. Suddenly it fell by her side 
heavily. Agnes Dabney ^nd Farmehe Kose come 
together again ? Hot if Parmelie Eose can help it !” 

She sprang from the bench, on Avhich she had 
thrown herself with a tired sigh, and fled, like one 
pursued, toward the path she had so recently 
mounted. Hetty followed her with wondering eyes. 
With the directness and speed of a chamois she made 
the passage between the bench and a dingy skiff 
that lay rocking among the reeds at the water’s 
edge. A man stood up in the boat and helped her 
to her place in the stern. Hetty could see that he 
was old and bent and black. Once in the skiff, her 
strange visitor drew the hood still further over her 
face, and dropped her head upon her Imees. With 
swift, skillful strokes her attendant conveyed her rap- 
idly across the narrow stream. Hetty could see her 
climb- the opposite bank wearily. She disappeared 
behind some bushes. The man shouldered his oars 
and carried them toward a little shanty, sitting back 
pn the bank, against whose door-jamb he stacked 


34 


A STEAUGE PILGBIMAGE. 


them. Evidently he was a regular ferryman. He 
resumed his interrupted work of caulking an up- 
turned skiff on the bank. Some cows came down 
to drink, and stood knee-deep in the clear water. 
Overhead a crow cawed and circled gracefully be- 
tween her and the blue sky. There was not a trace 
left of her strange visitor. Yes — there at the foot 
of the bench lay the key. Small, shining, mysterious 
link between the living and the dead. The woman 
said it must go into Uncle Kichard’s coffin. She 
could put it there as well as Parmelie Kose could. 


A PlLGIilMAGE. 


85 


CHAPTEK III. 


A NEGLECTED LEGACY. 



‘HERE was a carriage and several buggies out 


J- on the lawn, their shafts resting on the ground, 
and their mud-bespattered dash-boards telling of a 
long and hard pull through stiff mud. There were 
saddled horses, hitched to low, available limbs of the 
shade-trees, at whose rough bark they nibbled hun- 
grily. There was a group of bare-headed men 
standing about the open front door, who looked at 
her soberly as she came running up the slope of the 
hill from the river-side, flushed and hurried. Worst 
of all, there Avas her mother, already invested in the 
black bonnet and long A^eil which had been ordered 
so promptly, standing in the dining-room Avindow, 
evidently on the look out for her. The dining-room 
opened upon a low side-balcony, and it was by that 
balcony that Hetty had been planning to slip into 
the parlor and do Parmelie Rose’s errand. What 
had become of the morning ? 

Mrs. Ogden raised the sash of the dining-room 
window and sent an icy command cautiously out 
over the bright border of chrysanthemums that 


A ST^A:^GjSf PILQMMA§E. 


ae 

bordered that side of the house. It was her desire 
to be heard by no one but Hetty. 

‘‘ Henrietta, let me see you in your own room im- 
mediately !” 

Hetty sent a frightened “Yes, ma’am,’’ back over 
the bright chrysanthemums, and ran nimbly up the 
steps. Come what might, she would make one effort 
to get rid of the key, that seemed already to have 
branded its imprint upon her palm, so tightly did 
she clasp it. There had been rare occasions when 
she had defied her austere mother successfully. She 
ghded resolutely by the room where Mrs. Ogden was 
waiting for her, on into the great drawing-room, 
whose gloom was almost impenetrable to her, com- 
ing immediately into it from the dazzling outside 
sunlight. To her horror it was already full of peo- 
ple, sitting dumbly expectant of the dreary finale. 
Flushed and frightened she wound her way in and 
out among the close-packed chairs toward the som- 
ber central object in the room. She gave a cry of 
disappointment. The lid was already screwed down. 

“Is it impossible? Might I not see him once 
more ?” 

There was a movement among the men. Some 
one said something about calling the undertaker in. 
A hand was laid on Hetty’s ari^^i. She felt it tight- 
ening its hold painfuUy as her mother’s cold voice 
fell on the hushed group : 

“I beg none of you will put yourselves or the 


A STMAmE PILGRIMAGE. 37 

undertaker to any such trouble. Come wiih me, 
Henrietta !” 

The next moment they were alone in the small 
bedroom that had been appropriated to her use. 
She was sitting on the bed, sullen and defeated. Her 
mott ^r was standing majestically over her. 

Such hypocrisy, in one so young, I never wit- 
nessed! Your conduct of this morning surpasses 
anything. Do you suppose I am ignorant of the fact 
that you met Archibald Murray down by the 
river 

Hetty raised her head defiantly. 

“ I did not meet him ; he found me there. You 
shall not call me designing.” 

After that one violent protest, she sat dull and 
stupefied,' while her mother arraigned her with the 
prolixity and severity she was so drearily familiar 
with. Eelief came in the shape of Eob, who thrust 
his round head into the door to say briskly : 

Ma, the jDreacher’s come and the folks are wait- 
ing for you.” 

Mrs. Ogden cut her lecture short, with the assur- 
ance that Hetty need not think she was done with 
her, and moved toward the door. The tired and 
excited girl felt grateful for not being ordered to 
join the gloomy conclave in the drawing-room. She 
caught her breath with surprise when her mother de- 
liberately drew the key from the inner lock and re- 
placed it in the outer one. 


A STUAmiS PlLGniMAaR 


m 

“ What are you going to do, mother 

See that my family is not disgraced while I am 
at my brother’s funeral. Doctor Murray declines 
going to the burying-ground.” 

Mother, don’t do that ! You must not turn that 
key !” 

Her excitement was so intense and unusual that 
Mrs. Ogden paused, with her hand on the door- 
knob. 

Since when have you learned to dictate ?” 

I am not dictating now. You may lock me in, 
if you will send my Cousin Archibald to me as soon 
as you get back from the burying-ground.” 

Her blushes were painful to look at, but her tones 
and her words were absolutely fearless. 

Send — your — cousin — Archibald — to — you !” 

“Yes, ma’am ; I want to tell him about Parmehe 
Eose.” 

She had not calculated on the remarkable effect of 
her words. How could she ? The door-knob rattled 
under Mrs. Ogden’s clasp. Her lips grew as white as 
her pallid cheeks. She looked at the wondering girl 
before her, almost ferociously. Hetty came nearer 
to her, near enough to ask in a hissing whisper : 

“ Mother, was Parmehe Eose the woman my Uncle 
Eichard wanted to marry 

“M — m — m! You little fool!” 

She was thrust backward into the room with no 
gentle hand. The door was closed with a swift 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


39 


motion. She heard the key turned in the lock and 
withdrawn. She was a prisoner. 

I am glad of it ! Glad of it ! ISTothing to do 
but sit still and think what is best to do. I will see 
him to-night and give it to him. There’s nothing 
else to do with it.” 

She opened her hand and looked at the key. It 
glistened on her reddened palm. She dropped it in 
an open drawer. She stretched her arms wearily 
high over her head ; then suddenly and inexplicably 
burst into a passion of tears. What a day it had been. 
Sorrow, mystery, excitement ; with one shght line 
of sweetness and light running through it all. She 
felt as if it had all carried her swiftly and forever 
beyond the dull days that had been marked, even 
up to the one just gone, with a monotonous routine 
of service for the boys ; selfish little ingrates, who 
accejDted her as they did their daily bread, and in 
patient attendance i^^on the haughty caprices of her 
beautiful but rigid mother. 

She knew when they carried Mr. Dabney away 
by the trampling of many feet along the oil-clothed 
hall and upon the gravel outside. Then the house 
grew very still and she very sleepy. She flung her- 
self face downward on the bed and slept. A long 
time, it must have been and very soundly, for when 
she awoke there was a tray on a table at the foot of 
the bed. Her dinner had been brought in by some- 
body. She sprang up and tried the door. It was 


40 


A PILGRIMAGE. 


still locked. The room had grown quite dark, but 
that went for nothing. It was on the western side 
of the house, and the shutters were not only closed, 
but the Holland blinds drawn down, just as she 
had arranged it that morning herself before leaving 
it, with a view of preserving one spot sacred from 
an invasion of the Goths, as she privately called the 
boys. But what had become of everybody ? She 
sat down aimlessly in a chair by the window and 
twisted her loosened hair into a tighter coil. A 
locust started its shrill threnody high up in one of 
the big oak-trees. She could hear the cows lowing 
softly, sending encouragement ahead of them to the 
score or more of bleating calves down there by the 
bars. There was the sound of the ax out at the 
wood-pile — quick, ringing blows, such as were heard 
only in the early morning or late afternoon when 
Moses came up from the quarters to supply the 
kitchen wood-box. 

The day must be almost dead. She drew up the 
Holland blind and looked out through the closed 
shutters. The carriages and horses were gone ; the 
lawn was devoid of life ; the family must all be 
housed for the night, and this reasonless imprison- 
ment must terminate soon. She should see her 
Cousin Archibald again. The quick, sharp sound of 
a galloping horse fell on the silence — only the sound. 
Then she heard an imperative command ; she never 
bad heard her Cousin Archibald’s voice sav^ that 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


41 


morning, but it might sound like^ that if he were 
angry or determined. It was simply a command 
given to a dog — an order for him to “ go back.” A 
low, plaintive protest, and then a howl — such a 
mournful, prolonged howl as made Hetty clasp her 
hands to her ears to shut it out. The door opened, 
and a black, withered face appeared behind a lighted 
lamp. It was old Lucy. 

“ Yo’ ma say you kin come to supper, honey. 
Jus’ lis’n to dat dawg ! He do go on lak he saw ol’ 
Mars’ sperit, an’ I ain’ so sho’ he don’. Bless de 
chile, she ain’ et a moufful er dinner yit.” 

Hetty got up and came toward the lamp-bearer. 
They were already good friends. They believed in 
each other. 

Aunt Lucy,” she said, searching the top bureau- 
drawer eagerly for the key she had thrown there 
before lying down, want to see my Cousin 
Archibald before he goes to bed to-night. Tell him 
I must see him. I want to see him immediately.” 

That’s one uv the onpossibihties, honey. Mars’ 
Archie done gone, an’ I ain’t the one t’ blame him. 
I’s glad.” 

‘‘ Gone !” 

“ Plum clean gone, an’ he say he can’t tell whar 
nor when he’ll see this old nigger ag’in. He tol’ me 
to gin you this, honey. Mebbe it’ll give mo’ infum- 
mation then he give me. Miss Aggie don’t know 
’bout it.” 


4 ^ 


A PILGBIMAGS, 


ISTo ; it gave no more information. It was simply 
a friendly little note, telling Hetty how sorry he 
was to hear she had gone to bed with a bad, sick 
headache, as it deprived him of his one chance to 
say good-by. He found he must leave immediately, 
and he hoped, as the days went on and she came to 
feel more at home there, that she would be as happy 
as he had always been and as she deserved to be 
everywhere. 

Yery kind, but it meant nothing, and now he was 
out of reach ! What should she do with that dread- 
ful key ? Old Lucy stood regarding her anxiously 
while she read her note over and over again. 

‘‘Do it tek all that time to read that little 
letter, honey 

Hetty laughed confusedly and thrust the paper 
into her pocket. 

I was hopin’ he’d tell you whar he was going, 
leastways.” 

“Ho; he doesn’t seem to know himself.” 

“ An’ arter all the pains I tuk to gin ’im this, he 
done gallop olf an’ lef it on he’s bureau, lak it warn’ 
no ’count, an Mars’ Dick, ^vmeii he begin to fail, he 
say p’intedly : ‘ Lucy, see that Archibald gets that 

book !’ ” 

From under her apron Lucy produced an object, 
which certainly did not seem to possess any intrinsic 
value. It was a small, black quarto, dingy from old 
age, and clasped with a strong, metallic clasp of 
ancient date. 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE, 


43 


“ I wants to give it into yo’ keepin’, honey. I 
feels it in my bones that I am never gwine see Mars’ 
Archie no mo’, an’ I does b’leeve you is the onhes’ 
one of Miss Aggie’s fambly that don’ seem to re- 
joice at Mars’ Archie’s downfall.” 

Hetty had the book in her hand, and was turning 
it over and over absently. Queer that she should 
have been selected by fate as the repository of all 
the secrets that had been accumulating about this 
old house since before she was born. It beAvildered 
her. 

Aunt Lucy,” she asked suddenly, “ who is 
Parmelie Eose She seemed to be getting hold of 
so many disjointed mysteries. 

Parm’ly Eose ! Parm’ly Eose ! Whar you git hoi’ 
of dat name, chile ?” The old woman’s eyes were 
aflame with excitement. 

‘‘ I got it from herself. I saw her this morning.” 

You seen Miss Parm’ly Eose ? You seen her this 
morning? Thar you’s out, honey, or you mus’ a 
just dremp it, seein’ things is so stirred up ’bout 
you.” 

I saw her doAvn by the river-bench. • She came 
across the river in a skifiP. A tall woman Avith im- 
mense black eyes — eyes that burn like coals. She 
told me her name Avas Parmelie Eose. Did you 
ever knoAv her. Aunt Lucy ?” 

That sounds like her ; yes, it do. Them eyes o’ 
hern does burn. But, honey, my chile, Parm’ly Eose 


44 


A STBANGB PILGRIMAGE. 


ben shut up for mo’ years than you is ben in this 
world.” 

Shut up for what ?” 

Shut up for mad. Pity her folks did’n’ do it 
sooner. Den she could’ n’ a-done so much harm. 
No, she could’ n’ a-done all dat mischief. It was her. 
It warn’ nobody else that done it. May de Lord 
punish her mo’ and mo’ unter de third and fofe 
generation.” 

Lucy’s arm was raised in malediction. Her 
withered form was drawn to its utmost height. 
Her turbaned head trembled as if palsied. Hetty 
pushed a chair toward her. Here, then, was her 
chance to settle the mystery of the key. 

“ Sit down. Aunt Lucy. I want to hear all you 
know about Parmelie Kose.” 

Lucy glanced anxiously toward the door. Hetty 
satisfied her that it was entirely closed. The old 
crone sat for a second looking absently into the yel- 
low flame of the lamp. Presently she asked sus- 
piciously : 

“ Why don’t you ax your ma ? She know more’n 
a minute ’bout Parin’ ly Kose than I kin tell you in 
a hour. She an’ Miss Aggie was thick as hops ’bout 
the time Mars’ Dick Dabney come home from col- 
lege. She didn’ take long to feU in love with him, 
neither. 01’ Miss was livin’ then, an’ she favor it, 
too. Miss Parm’ly was a han’some one, I tell you, 
an’ she was rich on top o’ that. She rich as cream. 
Now, why don’t you ax your ma ’bout her ?” 


A STBAmE PILGRIMAGE. 


46 


“I have.’’ 

“Well ?” 

“ She won’t talk to me about her, Aunt Lucy.” 
Here the girl raised her right hand solemnly. “ If I 
take my solemn oath that I will make no use of what 
you may tell me, excepting to benefit my Cousin 
Archibald, wiU you tell me then ?” 

“ Sw’ar it !” 

Hetty formulated an innocuous oath and swore 
it.” 

“ Yo’ ma c’uld kill me, or sell me off the place, or 
do anything she’d a min’ to, gal, ef you brek dat 
oath.” 

“ I shall not break it.” 

“ Ef you does, I’ll come back from de udder work 
’spressly to ha’nt you.” 

Lucy’s words were the only terrible things at her 
command. But they fell on dauntless ears. 

“Miss Parm’ly was the one that worked the thing 
with Miss Aggie. She’s yo’ ma, and de Lord soften 
her heart and mek clean her ways, but Miss Aggie 
done mek up her min’ long ’go to stan’ jus’ whar she 
stan’ to-day — at de top uv de Dabney ladder. But, 
honey, I wouldn’t hev what Miss Parm’ly — I won’t 
say Miss Aggie, fur she jus’ are Miss Parm’ly — got 
on her conscience fur all de gol’ an’ de silver an’ de 
rubies which ain’ yit ben dig up out’n de bowels uv 
de airth.” 

“ What has she on her conscience ?” 


46 


A STBAJ^GB PILGRIMAGE. 


“She have hes an’ broken promises an’ black 
deceit an’ the puttin’ ’sunder uv man an’ wife, arter 
God done j’ne togedder, which is p’intedly ag’in 
Scripter. Ain’ that ’nough ?” 

“ More than enough,” said Hetty, shivering ; par- 
tially from the nervous excitement and partially 
from the chill autumn atmosphere. “What man 
and wife did she put asunder ?” 

“ Mars’ Dick Dabney and his lawful wedded wife.” 

“My Uncle Kichard a married man !” 

The door opened softly. Lucy’s dark face turned 
ashen with terror. She was on her feet and ratthng 
the dishes on the tray at a furious rate by the time 
Mrs. Ogden was fairly inside the room. 

“I wuz jus’ sayin’ t’ Miss Hetty, Miss Aggie, 
that this warn’ begin t’ do. Ef Mandy’s cookin’ ain’ 
good ’nough fur her. I’ll hafter swing dem pots ’roun’ 
some myself.” She laughed nervously. Her laugh 
was scarcely more than a feeble cackle. 

“ I expect Mandy’s cooking will be good enough 
for her after to-day, Lucy. Miss Henrietta has 
been a little upset by all this excitement, naturally .” 

“ Yassum. Jus’ es you say. Miss Aggie, this is 
be’n a tryin’ day.” She had the heavy waiter poised 
easily on her head now. “Jus’ ’member how ol’ 
Mars’ use t’ brag on Lucy’s waffles en buckwheats. 
Miss Aggie ! Lucy were some dem days.” 

“Yes, I remember, Lucy. I remember perfectly 
well. You can go now.” 


A STMASGE PILGRIMAGE. 




The old woman turned in the door-way to send a 
look of pitiful appeal toward Hetty over her moth- 
er’s shoulder. Ho worded assurance of good faith 
was possible. 

“ You are at liberty, too,” said Mrs. Ogden coldly, 
turning a searching look upon Hetty’s face. 

“ I believe I will go to bed,” she answered, draw- 
ing the comb from her heavy hair as she spoke. 
“ The boys can get themselves to bed to-night.” 

“ And how about your Cousin Arcinoald ?” 

‘‘He is not here. Did you send him away, 
mother ? Didn’t you even try to soften things for 
him?” 

“ Who told you he was gone ?” 

“ Aunt Lucy. She’ brought me this.” 

From the depths of the pocket, into which she 
had hastily thrust the little black book, Hetty drew 
Archibald’s note. She was not enamored of de- 
ceit, and there was no reason why that note should 
be added to the necessary concealments weighing 
so heavily on her tender conscience. 

Mrs. Oorden read the note and tossed it back con- 
temptuously. 

“ I suppose you will wear it next your heart !” 

Hetty tore it into small bits and scattered them 
over the carpet. 

“ How much more information have you extracted 
from that old crone ?” 

“ Who ? Aunt Lucy ?” 


4^ A STJiAJ^GI! PILGRIMAGE. 

‘‘Wliat other crone are you on intimate terms 
with?” 

‘‘I thought perhaps you meant Parmelie Eose. 
She is more haggish-looking than Aunt Lucy.” 

She was combing her hair in front of the glass. 
Her mother was behind her. She was at a loss to 
understand her own defiant mood. She was in a 
state of tumultuous inward rebellion against the 
only authority she had ever bowed to unquestion- 
ingly. That her mother had ever done worse than 
maneuver, heartlessly and selfishly, to keep the Dab- 
ney property in the family, was not in her concep- 
tion. She was still at a loss to understand the pow- 
erful emotion the mere mention of Parmelie Eose’s 
name excited in her mother, usually so statuesque in 
her composure. By the dim reflection of her face, 
cast upon the glass by the lamp standing close to it, 
she could see that strange glitter come again into 
her eyes. 

“ You have spoken of Parmelie Eose twice to-day 
and told me that you had seen her. She was a very 
dear friend of mine in girlhood. She lost her mind 
many years ago. She has been confined for a great 
many years in a private asylum. The sudden men- 
tion of her name by you this morning came as a 
shock to me. You are not hkely to see or hear of 
her again.” 

‘‘ I hope not.” 

She walked over to the window to pull down the 


A STMNQE PILQUIMAOK ' 

Holland blind. The house stood low upon the ground. 
With a scream of terror she recoiled from the win- 
dow. There, clearly revealed by the pallid moon- 
light in which the lawn was bathed, stood Parmelie 
Kose, her hooded face pressed close against the 
glass. 


50 


A STRAmE PILGRIMAGE. 


CIIAPTEE lY. 

A GKAVE-YAED TEYST. 

T he HEXT landing is j^ours, young man. We 
will be there in fifteen minutes. Asleep !” 
This piece of information, with supplementary 
inquiry, was sung into Archibald Murray’s ears in 
a hearty voice, and was accompanied by a rather 
superfluous slap on the back, as he sat on the 
guard of the steamer Magnolia with his arms fold- 
ed and his hat drawn over his brow, staring vacant- 
ly over the water at the monotonous scenery of 
the lower Mississippi Eiver, wrapped in a profound 
reverie. 

The Mississippi Eiver steamboat captain of the 
olden times was an institution, in his way — combin- 
ing an amount of shrewdness, good-humor, activity 
and hospitality not called for in any other ofiicial 
known to the traveling public. He was apparently 
gifted with ubiquity, was always on hand to pull 
the big bell-rope, or escort a lady passenger across 
the long stage-plank, or to preside with courtly ease 
at the head of the “ captain’s table,” or to settle, with 
summary firmness, a row between roustabout and 
mate. Such a man was entitled to a slight margin 
in the way of familiarity. 


A STJ^AJVGI^ PILGRIMAGE. 


51 


Archie did not resent that vigorous and unex- 
pected descent of the captain’s broad palm upon his 
motionless shoulders. He had been wrapped in a 
profound reverie, touching the past, the present and 
the future. It was a somher-hued reverie. He had 
elected to try his fortunes in one of the lower Louis- 
iana parishes, urged thereto by Clayton, whose kins- 
folk he was accredited to, and he was trying to fore- 
cast his own future in their midst. 

He pushed his hat back to get a better view of 
the captain’s rugged face as he said : 

I suppose you are fairly well acquainted with 
these river parishes, captain ?” 

The captain laughed derisively. 

Oh, no ! Don’t know nothing at all about ’em ! 
Been landing once a week at every point on the 
river between Memphis and Hew Orleans for twenty 
years without finding out anything about the folks 
or their plantations. That’s the sort of fool I am !” 

Hawkspoint, as I understand it, is my landing, 
and the Glen plantation i^ six or seven miles in- 
land,” Archie went on, referring to a letter he took 
from his pocket. 

“ Glen’s got three plantations back from the river. 
If 3^ou happen to mean the one he lives on — the 
^ Homestead,’ as they call it — you’ye got a stiffish 
ride ahead of you. I suppose Glen’s looking for 
you ?” 

I think not. I simply wrote that I would be 


52 


A STBAmiJ PILORIMAGE. 


here sometime this week. I suppose I can hire a 
vehicle 

‘‘ ]^ot much !” the captain said, with another one 
of his derisive, jolly laughs. The folks down here 
ainT that sort. They might lend you a trap, but no 
hiring. You’ve got your own nag aboard, haven’t 
you ?” 

Y es. Meteor was one thing nobody cared to in- 
herit. He’s a devil for anybody but me.” 

All you’ve got to do, then, is to make somebody 
put you on the right track to Glen’s. It don’t mat- 
ter what time you get there, you’re sure of a hospit- 
able reception. There ain’t a mean bone in Glen’s 
body. If you roust him out of bed at midnight 
he’ll tell you he’s glad to see you.” 

I wish you would tell me,” Archie said, standing 
up to face the captain more evenly, but his words 
were drowned in the unearthly whistle that just 
then began to blow immediately over their heads. 
The captain hastened away to the post of duty, and 
Murray leaned eagerly over the guard-rail to catch 
the first glimpse of his future home and possible 
constituency. 

The outlook was not reassuring. It was the fall 
of the year, and the river-bank, at the Hawkspoint 
Landing, was strewn thickly with cotton-bales and 
sacks of cotton-seed, awaiting shipment. The rich, 
black soil was cut into deep ruts by the constant 
action of heavy wheels, and further defiled by the 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


53 


presence of a herd of starved cows and calves, who 
tramped and nosed restlessly about the spot, glean- 
ing stray whisps of hay or a few scattered grains of 
corn that spilled through holes in the corn- 
sacks. 

The whistling of the steamer brought to the land- 
ing a motley gathering of men and boys, white and 
black, some with business to attend to, more with 
none. 

Mght had followed quickly in the wake of the 
setting sun, and the huge pine-torches that flared 
from the prow of the steamboat cast a weird light 
upon this scene as the boat slowly and cautiously 
felt her way to the exact spot where the hard-beaten 
foot-path led up from the long gang- way to the top 
of the bank. 

The group of men and boys gathered there cast 
grotesque shadows of themselves in every direction, 
as the flaring torches flamed now one way, now an- 
other. 

Young Murray found it rather a dispiriting occu- 
pation, looking down upon this motley gathering. 
Those were the people upon whom he was about to 
become dependant for his daily bread, not one among 
whom had ever heard his name mentioned. His 
boasted skill in physiognomy was valueless to him 
here. There were just so many* hats, so many noses, 
legs and arms brought into view by the fitful torch- 
light. 


54 


A PILOBIMAGE. 


A few minutes later he stood in their midst, pass- 
ing his hand soothingly over Meteor’s quivering 
nostrils, who was yet trembhng in fright at his en- 
forced passage of the narrow stage-plank from the 
steamer to the shore. He scarcely knew to whom 
to address himself, and felt absurdly homesick for 
the steamer, which was already noisily puffing its 
way to the next landing down the river. 

His trunks and boxes were piled up on the bank 
beside him, but it seemed to be nobody’s business to 
inquire into their final destination. He was the re- 
cipient of a not unkindly curiosity, but of no offi- 
cious interference in his affairs. He raised his voice 
to ask: 

Is there any one here who belongs to the Glen- 
cove Plantation ?” 

‘^Me boss!” An old negro stepped out of the 
crowd, armed with an ox-goad, which reached the 
proportions of a young sapling. In his left hand he 
held his shaggy cap, baring his gray wool to the 
night air as he bowed courteously. I is Keuben ; 
ol’ man Rube, folks calls me for short. I is the 
Glencove teamster. Kin I sarve you 

Archie yielded instantaneous confidence to the 
wrinkled but honest face that beamed upon him 
smilingly. 

‘‘You are the man I am looking for, then,” he 
said. “ You will show me the way and take charge 
of my luggage.” He vaulted upon Meteor’s back 


A STMAms PimniMAGB. 


55 


and stooped over to adjust the stirrup-leathers. He 
was impatient to start on that “ stiffish ride.” 

Eeuben stepped forward promptly to render this 
service for him. 

“You’ll need dem splashers hefo’ you gits to de 
end uv yo’ ride, young mister. Thar’s a sight er 
mud ’twix’ yhere an’ Glenco’. You needn’t pester 
’bout yo’ baggage. It’s all right ; but, son, I ’lows 
that critter you’s backin’ ain’ gwine give his consent 
to keep long side uv my oxin. I is in wid the ox- 
team t’day. All you got to do, howsomedever, is to 
f oiler de levee tell you come t’ de by’er, an’ den turn 
t’ y o right an’ foller de by’er tell you come to a strip 
uv woods, an’ den foller de straight wagin-road 
thro’ them woods till you come to a big, white 
gate, an’ when you gits on the udder side a-that 
gate you’s all right. That’s Glenco’.” 

“But,” said Archibald, laughing down at old 
Eeuben, who had accompanied these lucid directions 
by hand and arm gestures to indicate the various 
turns ill the road, “ I’m not aU right. I don’t want 
to spend the night in the Glencove fields.” 

Old Eeuben drew himself up with stately dignity. 

“ Sail, thar ain’t no danger o’ nobody spendin’ the 
night in Mars’ Leonard Glen’s fiels. W’en you git 
inside er dat gate, you’ll see a big, w’ite house, all 
scrouged about wid bushes an’ shrubberies an’ trees, 
wid lights a shinin’ from so many winders that the 
blackes’ night can’t hide it from folks. All you’s 


56 


A srnAmjs; pilquimaqA 


got t’ do after you pass through that gate is t’ toiler 
yo’ nose. And, son,” he added briskly, as Archie 
thanked him and touched Meteor’s flanks lightly 
with the whip, don’ you f orgit t’ shet that big gate 
arter you. Our fiel’s is full er punkins jis’ now, an’ 
we don’ ’low t’ feed ’em t’ ol’ Squire Mason’s cattle. 
I’ll git thar wid yo’ traps some time ’twix’ this an’ 
kingdom come.” 

Professing himself quite satisfied with this vague 
promise, the doctor touched Meteor again on the 
flank, and was soon out of sight of the little group 
of loungers who took a perennial interest in the 
mild happenings that followed on every landing of 
a steamboat. 

As Meteor splashed his way through the one long 
muddy street of Hawkspoint, Archibald took rapid 
notes. There was a tiny church steeple, rising 
modestly above the low dwelling-houses of the ham- 
let. There was a blacksmith’s shop, its forge all 
aglow, and the ringing blows upon, its anvil striking 
sharply upon the night air. There were trees and 
shrubs in front of every house, shielding it from 
vulgar curiosity. He liked that. 

For a mile or two after losing sight of the town 
his way lay along a river-side road, flanked on one 
side by the tall hedging that inclosed somebody’s 
cotton-fields, on the other by the inevitable levee, 
high and grass-grown, shutting from view the river 
he had so recently parted company with. It was a 


A PILGRIMAGE. 


57 

darksome and lonely road to those most familiar 
with it, but dismally so to one traveling it for the 
first time. He was conscious of rather nervously 
straining his ears in hopes of catching old Keuben’s 
stentorian jee-haw,” or at least the creaking of his 
heavy wagon- wheels. 

The wood into which he turned presently were 
still more somber. The trees were not so closely 
ranged but that he could see their long gray beards 
of Spanish moss swaying dismally in the night wind, 
nor the road so wide but that frequently, when 
Meteor stepped daintily to one side to avoid an un- 
usually nasty-looking mud-puddle, he felt the cool, 
soft touch of the mossy tendrils caressing his cheek 
like ghostly fingers at a dark seance. Suddenly, by 
the light of the new-risen moon, the glimmer of 
water became visible. That must be Keuben’s bayou ! 
And there, a little beyond, were two spectral, white 
gate-posts. It must be the Glencove gate. They 
loomed on his vision more agreeably than on 
Meteor’s, who, at sight of them, gave one terrified 
snort and plunged to one side with such suddenness 
as to break the girth to his saddle and unhorse his 
rider, whom he recklessly deserted to his fate, as he 
galloped back over the road they had just traveled. 

This was a pleasant predicament! It was bad 
enough to follow old Keuben’s directions in this 
obscure light from the vantage ground of Meteor’s 
back ; it would be trebly hard to pick his waj^ through 


58 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


the muddy fields on foot, not to speak of the exces- 
sively disagreeable prospect of presenting himself 
before the Glencove people in the guise of a mud- 
bespattered tramp and demand hospitality. First 
impressions went a long way. 

There was no choice left him, however. Meteor 
Avas long since out of hearing of the fierce reproaches 
he hurled after him, and unless he really did mean 
to spend the night in Mr. Glen’s fields, he must 
move forward on foot. Fortunately a new moon be- 
friended him. 

Perhaps, but for Meteor’s treachery he Avould not 
have come to that sudden halt in the middle of the 
broad fields, bewildered and confused. Keuben had 
told him that after passing through the big gate he 
would see a lot of trees and shrubs, behind Avhich the 
Glencove dwelling AAms hidden aAA^ay. There were 
two groves in sight, a small one to his right, nearer 
by many rods than the larger and more distaiit one. 
He Avas quite sure he could see the gleam of a white 
fence about the nearer one. If he had been in the 
saddle he Avould have seen the spreading roof of the 
mansion-house dimly outlined against the more dis- 
tant trees. 

As it Avas, he veered abruptly to the right toward 
the neafer and smaller grove. Apparently — he told 
himself — in so doing, he had gotten out of the plain 
road, for he found himself plunging directly across 
cotton-ridges that seemed interminable, Avhose inter- 


A J3TMAMB PimMlMAeK 


Si) 

veiling furrows were sodden with moisture and 
yielded treacherously under his soaked feet. After 
all, these trees that he was nearing might simply 
belong to an outlying bit of pasture land, for cer- 
tainly the trudge he was making did not indicate the 
approach to a gentleman’s country-seat. The grove 
stood on an extensive knoll. He was alongside the 
gleaming white pickets that girdled the trq^ — black- 
thorn and cedars principally, as well as he could 
judge in that obscure light — before he discovered the 
scattered marble head-stones which explained the 
nature of the inclosure. “The family burying- 
ground,” he said, with an impatient exclamation 
over the time and energy he had expended in mak- 
ing this useless discovery. He stood still for a 
second to cast about him for the most direct route to 
that other grove, from which he had been traveling 
all this time. In that second he became aware of a 
living personality in there among the silent dead. 
There was a soft, shuffling sound, as of a slow, 
steady footfall among the fallen leaves. It came to 
his ears more distinctly every second. Presently a 
red glow, hke the tip of a lighted cigar. He could 
see it winding in and out among the thickly planted 
head-stones, now nearer, now more distant, some- 
times lost entirely, only to reappear in an unex- 
pected quarter. He placed himself behind a tree 
which grew just outside the picket-fence. He would 
wait until that broad, white cloud floated from off 


i^O A STBAmJS PILGRIMAGE. 

the face of the moon, and discover, if possible, 
whether this lonely watcher among the dead were a 
man of his own color or some depredator. The 
neighborhood was entirely unknown to him and he 
to it. He shouldn’t care to be challenged as a tres- 
passer, and probably fired at without a chance for 
explanation. 

The faint fragrance of the cigar floated to him on 
the heavy night air. The smoker came and stood 
leaning motionlessly over the small picket-gate. 
Clearly it was a white man ; his apparel and his 
attitude betrayed that much to the watcher behind 
the tree. While Archibald was hastily formulating 
some mode of explaining his own awkward situation 
there glided past him and toward the man at the 
gate a tall, slight form, wrapped in a long, clinging 
cloak. The smoker flung his cigar far out across 
the wet fields and put out a hand hastily : 

‘‘You are late. Mademoiselle,” Archibald heard 
him say, a trifle impatiently, as he drew the tall 
form inside the gate by the hand he had reached 
out for so eagerly, and disappeared with it among 
the blackthorns and cedars that spread their somber 
branches over the gleaming white tomb-stones. 

Singularly averse to mystery of any sort. Doctor 
Murray found it specially obnoxious, meeting him 
thus on the very threshold of his new life, and per- 
haps involving the people among whom he expected 
to make his home. He advanced resolutely. If 


A STJiAJ^GjEf PILGRIMAGE, 


there was to be anything inexplicable in the home- 
life he was about to take up, he did not propose to 
lose the clew accident had placed in his hands. He 
cautiously circumvented the white picket-fence upon 
the outside. As he anticipated, it enclosed a small 
building, scarcely larger than a tool-house, its rear 
end being built into the fence. A dead-wall con- 
fronted him. He walked the full breadth of this 
wall, baffled and disappointed. A faint line of light 
in one side of the building showed where a solid 
wooden shutter was located. Fate favored him. 
He had scarcely made this discovery, when a sudden 
and violent gust of wind blew, it open, revealing a 
rough interior, a table in the center, on which stood 
a shaded lamp, and at which, seated near each other, 
Avere the man and the woman Avho had excited his 
curiosity to so indiscreet a pitch. 

The man’s back was turned to him. Evidently, 
in his absorption, he had not yet taken note of the 
swaying shutter. The woman’s profile Avas turned 
to him. She had thrown back the hood to her 
AA^rap, and Avith hands folded on the table before 
her, sat like a beautiful carven image. Her profile 
Avas singularly delicate in contour, and even in that 
fleeting glimpse Archibald took notice of the rich 
mass of Avaving yelloAV hair that Avas knotted on 
the top of her head. She shivered. The man 
raised his eyes from an open book before him, and 
glancing over his shoulder, rose hastily and dreAV the 


A &TilAMoM PILGR1MA(}K 


ki 

heavy wooden shutter back into place. Archibald 
could hear him slide the iron bolt into its socket. 
There would be no more chance revealments that 
night. 

Archibald had made good use of that one oppor- 
tunity, however. It had served him to decide that 
the woman who was keeping this strange tryst was 
both young and beautiful, while the man revealed 
in that hasty transit from table to window was 
bent, either from age or infirmity, and plain to the 
point of ugliness. 

Beauty and the Beast holding tryst among the 
tomb-stones,” he said disgustedly, and slowly pick- 
ing his way back to his starting-point he trudged 
once more across the cotton-ridges, and regaining 
the main road, turned his face toAvard the larger 
grove. 

He Avas right this time. Hearer and nearer the 
big Avhite house, with its hospitably lighted Avin- 
doAvs, loomed gratefully upon his tired vision. Hoav 
could he ever ignorantly have stepped aside to that 
spot of mystery and darkness ? They had nothing 
in common with each other. He was but a yard or 
tAvo from the pretty yard-gate that led up to the 
Glencove house, Avhen a tall, slight form, Avrapped 
in a clinging, dark cloak, passed SAviftly by him, en- 
tered the gate, and was SAvalloAved up by the shrub- 
bery in Mr. Glen’s front yard. 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


63 


CHAPTEE Y. 

THE HERMIT OF ALLIGATOR ISLAND. 

HE DOOE of the tool-house stood wide open. 



There was nothing inside to .tempt depredators. 
Tavo hard AAmoden chairs and a small deal-table, for 
commnience in sorting seed, and a lot of tools 
stacked in one corner, that was all. The new moon, 
just about to drop below the horizon, sent a slanting 
beam through the opening to shimmer on the broad, 
clean blade of a neAV spade. For all else, it, Avas as 
dark in there as outside among the shadoAvs cast by 
the blackthorns and the cedars. A resident frog 
leaped AAdth purposeless energy from the spongy 
turf of a sunken grave, marked only by a head-stone, 
to the pedestal of a stately column that vied Avith 
the cedars in altitude. Its chill splendor Avas in turn 
spurned as a resting-place for the Avooden-step of 
the tool-house. One more leap and he looked out 
upon the Avorld with round, prominent eyes from the 
center of the table in the deserted room. From that 
eminence he gave the pitch for the evening concert 
in his capacity as leader. From under the sunken 
stones; from out the sodden heaps of last year’s 
leg^ves ; from the gnarled roots of an p^ncient oak, 


64 


A STBAmU PILGRIMAGE. 


that spread protecting arms about the tool-house, 
came prompt response. There was nothing to startle 
them from their sense of security. The man who 
had held them awed and silenced by his heavy foot- 
fall, invading their sacred haunt with brutal disre- 
gard of their feelings, had taken himself elsewhere. 

Had taken himself to the banks of a narrow 
bayou that coursed sluggishly along the boundary 
line of the Glen place for several ]niles before open- 
ing out into a broad, placid lake, which spread its 
silvery expanse in front of half a dozen of the finest 
plantations in the parish. Tall trees bowed their 
stately heads so close together across the narrow 
current of the bayou that in midday cool, dark 
shadows rested on its bosom. Brambles and vines 
and burrs and rushes disputed the supremacy of its 
tangled banks. Dead trees spanned it and sent their 
wet, blackened branches out to impede its progress 
with armfuls of slimy moss and weeds. Spectral 
cypress trees lifted their pallid cones from its dark- 
est depths. The black moccasin coiled about their 
smooth crowns with shining convolutions; turtles 
sunned themselves on its moss-clad bridges ; alliga- 
tors glided in and out among the stumps and the 
roots and the wet mosses; timid cranes stalked 
mincingly along its borders or stood motionless 
among its shadows on one slender leg. Only the 
stock that roamed at large appreciated the bayou as 
au inexhaustible drinking-trough, Ho one had any 


A STJ2AJV^GJ^ PIZamMAGI^. 


65 


use for it, and yet, on that particular night, a canoe 
was fastened to one of the dead trees that spanned 
it, and as it swung lightly to and fro, moved by the 
Avind and the current,- the clanldng of its chain made 
a dismal note in the stillness. People said the bayou 
was not navigable, but such a craft as the one that 
Avas chained to the dead tree might be slowly pro- 
pelled through its impediments by the skillful use of 
a single oar. 

There AA-as not a glimmer of moonlight when a 
man stepped cautiously out over the moss-grown 
tree, and letting himself doAvn into the canoe, loos- 
ened the chain, dropped it into the bottom of the 
boat, and began slowly and cautiously to paddle 
against the sluggish current in the direction of the 
open lake. Once free from the obstructions of the 
ba^^ou, his progress Avas marvelously rapid. He plied 
the single oar noAv on one side, noAV on the other of 
the canoe, keeping her prow pointed straight at a 
small circular island that lay on the bosom of the 
lake not more than a mile or tAvo from the mouth of 
the bayou. It did not cover more than an acre or 
tAvo of space, and to all seeming Avas an unbroken 
mass of verdure. The same semi-tropical tangle of 
bush and vine and brier Avhich distinguished the 
banks of the bayou prevailed here. 

Approaching the bank as closely as practicable, 
the man in the canoe laid his paddle softly doAvn in 
the bottom of the boat ancl executed a peculiar 


66 


A STEAWGB PILORBIAGE. 


whistle. It consisted of two short notes, one pro* 
longed one, then two intore short ones, the whole 
confined to a subdued undertone, which, like all his 
motions, suggested an ever-present sense of caution. 

From the bushes on the bank, not in front of him, 
but several yards farther to the south of the island, 
came an echo to his whistle. He grasped the over- 
hanging vines and bushes and slowly pulled the boat 
around in direction of the sound. The whistle was 
repeated once more from the bank, when, with a 
vigorous swing, he sent his slight craft clean up 
among the rushes and briers, beaching and hiding it 
at one maneuver. 

A hand was held out to him from the shore. He 
availed himself of it while clambering over the gun- 
wale of the boat. 

“ What is this for he asked. 

The bushes were beginning to look bent at the 
other place.” 

There’s a lot of stuff in the boat. Help me to 
get it out. Here, take the bag. I can manage the 
rest.” 

He swung a heavy gunny-sack across the shoul- 
ders of the man who had come down to meet him, 
and loading himself down with the rest of the boat’s 
cargo, followed in silence the lead of his companion 
along a foot-path so narrow that they liad to walk 
single file, and at times, with both hands, push aside 
the tall, smooth, can^-roots which refused them pa§- 


A STJiAm^ PILGMIMAGE. 


(j1 

sage. At the apparent center of the island, the man 
who was in the lead stooped and opened wide a 
door, whose exterior was so curiously matted with 
branches and vines as to be indistinguishable from 
the surrounding verdure when closed. He held it 
open for his companion to pass through. Both men 
had to bow their heads to pass under the low lintel. 
Once inside, every trace of uncultivated nature was 
obliterated. They were in a small room, whose low 
ceiling and contracted space were strikingly inade- 
quate to the comforts and even elegancies that had 
accumulated within them. 

A bright stuffed portiere hung on the inside of 
the door they had entered by. Book-cases, tools of 
all sorts, maps, dumb-bells, pictures, curiously woven 
articles of palmetto, crowded the space on the walls 
so thickly that no one would have suspected they 
were hung with ordinary crimson canton- flannel. 
Two curious things were noticeable. There were no 
windows to the room, and no chimney to the house, 
if house it was. 

In the center of the apartment was a charcoal- 
furnace, such as country housewives use for out-door 
preserving purposes, and in this was a glowing, smoke- 
less Are. A heap of fragrant pine-cones lay by the 
side of the furnace, and dumping his gunny-sack 
down in one corner of the room, the younger man 
proceeded to throw a double handful of them upon 
the glowing charcoal. They crackled and blazed 
cheerfully. 


68 


A STRAmE PILGRiMACfE. 


‘^You look cold and tired,” he said, drawing a 
large easy-chair close to the furnace and gently 
pressing the older man into its arms. “ This thing 
is wearing you out, father. Why not give it up 
Wearing me out! toot! nonsense!” The old 
man spread his vein-seamed hands out over the crack- 
ling pine-cones. ‘‘ It’s a little chilly to-night, that’s 
all, and I ought to have changed my coat before 
starting, but I never thought of it.” 

“hTo; you have no time to think of yourself, and 
yet how many worthless lives like mine do you 
count yours to be worth 1” 

Don’t talk that way, George ! Don’t do it, son ! 
It hurts me worse than anything you do. I’ll be 
all right in a second. What makes my teeth chatter 
so infernally ?” 

He was an old man, the one who had just come 
through the gloom of the night and the damp chill 
of water travel, and the toil had not been shght. 
His face, a thoughtful one, deeply seamed with 
anxious lines, was blue and pinched with cold. 

‘‘You are getting a chill ! You have one now! 
Hold on ! Let me mix you something hot. I thought 
perhaps you’d be over to-night, and I’ve got the 
water all ready.” He turned toward a table against 
the waU, where a small copper tea-kettle, swung over 
a spirit-lamp, was hissing and spluttering energetic- 
ally". He was evidently an expert in the business, 
for the mingled fragrance of lemon, hot wine and 


A PILGRIMAGBi. 


69 


nutmeg soon floated out upon the air as he came 
toward the furnace with two brimming goblets of 
negus in his hand. One he extended to his father : 

Drink this, father, while it is hot. It will make 
you look at life differently. Here’s to Colonel 
Hegus.” 

He laughed recklessly, took down half the con- 
tents of his goblet at a draught and set it down on 
the table, while he applied his handkerchief to the 
long moustache which swept his chin. The shaded 
lamp on the little stand by the brazier did not 
illuminate the room very brilliantly. Perhaps it 
was better so, for the old man in the easy-chair 
would have carried away with him a heavier load of 
care than he brought if he could have seen the blue 
vein tracery on the hands that mixed the negus, or 
noted the sunken temples over which his son’s long 
black hair fell in careless waves. It was a hand- 
some face, in spite of its extreme pallor, and the 
form, upon which the coat began to hang altogether 
too loosely, still indicated an unusual degree of 
sinewy grace. 

They took turn about, this father and son, in 
comforting each other. God knows they both 
needed comforting at all times and seasons. To- 
night it was the son’s turn. The old man was at a 
lower ebb,” he said to himself, than he had been 
for months. 

“ Come ! while you drink your negus, empty your 
budget. What’s going on in the world ?” 


70 A STBAmE PILGRIMAGE. 

‘‘ISTothing much — nothing at all, in fact. Glen 
and his wife got back from ^^^ew Orleans last week. 
Mason’s gin has broken down again. You know it 
always does break down just when he begins to gin. 
Martin’s talking about putting in a draining-machine, 
and — oh, yes ! something has happened, or is about 
to happen. We are going to have a new doctor! 
Glen’s imported him, I believe !” 

I am glad to hear it.” 

‘‘Glad! Why?” 

“ Because you ought to have given up practicing 
long ago. You don’t need the money, and you are 
getting too old to be at the beck and call of every 
hysterical woman. Yes, I am glad of it !” 

“ If I don’t practice what will I do ? Sit down at 
home and think and eat my heart out ?” 

“ Ho ! Go with me, father, where the name of 
Bemish will never be heard again !” 

The old man dashed his empty goblet from him 
with such vehemence that it fell upon the brickMoor 
shattered into a thousand bits. He rose to his feet, 
quivering in every muscle. 

“Ho, sir! By the Almighty, I will not turn my 
back on the old place until the name of Bemish is 
washed clean from every stain !” 

“ And you really expect to see that day ?” 

The younger man had more control of his nerves 
and muscles than the older one. It would have 
taken a keen physiognomist to trace the lines of 


A STMAI^GB PILORIMAOE. 71 

anguish in his smooth, almost boyish features. He 
stood with his hands folded behind his back, looking 
into his father’s face with eyes that questioned hope 
and denied reason. 

“Ido.” 

“ Are you any nearer to it than you were a month 
ago, father 

“ I was on the very threshold of it. The truth 
was almost within my grasp when the devil inter- 
fered to defend his own !” 

“ That is a trick he has played you so often,” said 
his son bitterly, “ that I should think you would not 
expect any different results. What did he do this 
time ?” 

“ Blew wide open an accursed shutter just as she 
had taken the pen in her hand to write the truth. 
The spell was broken for to-night.” 

“ Father,” the young man said, “ I want you to 
tell me one thing very truthfully.” 

“Well?” 

“ Will this thing hurt her ?” 

“ Mentally or physically, do you mean ?” 

“ Either way — any way ?” 

“ Honsense ! Do you suppose I am going to com- 
mit murder ?” 

He was nervous and excited, and the words slipped 
from his lips with unnecessary emphasis. 

Both men winced under it. The younger one 
walked over to the table, and replenishing his goblet, 
drained it before speaking again, 


72 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


I don’t suspect 3^ou of wanting to hurt a 
hair of Miss Glen’s head, but unless she has changed 
greatly in two years, she is of a highly-strung, ner- 
vous temperament, and just the sort to be unhinged 
by the experiment you are trying. Better leave 
things as they are, father, than try to mend them by 
harming her.” 

Two years !” The old man evidently had heard 
nothing that followed after those words. Two years 
of wrong, of insult, of mj^stery and misery !” 

‘‘ Two years !” the young man repeated after him 
bitterly, of exile, of loneliness, of life in a lair ! 
"Why, the beasts of the fields are to be envied !” 

A somber, brooding silence fell between them. 
The heap of pine-cones was reduced to one. The 
coals in the brazier glowed dully. The old man’s 
head sank upon his br-east; tired nature asserted 
herself and he fell asleep. The younger one sat 
with his great dark eyes fixed upon the dull glow of 
the furnace. He could not trust himself to close 
them. Before the first faint streak of dawn revis- 
ited the earth he must arouse that poor old man and 
see him to his boat, and with his own hands give 
him the impetus that would send him out again over 
the dark, cold v^ter homeward. He brought a pil- 
low and laid it under his father’s head, resting it on 
the stand by the chair. He brought an afghan and 
wrapped it tenderly about his bent form. There 
Avas nothing left to do but Avatoh, 


A STJiASaM/ FILGBIMAQ^, 


n 


\ 

i CHAPTEK YI. 

THE BEMISH TRAGEDY. 

S TANDING on the broad veranda of the Glen 
Homestead, with the sparkle and the glitter 
and the cheerful hum of an early, sunlit morning all 
about him ; with the somber branches of the ever- 
greens in the big front yard a-flutter with countless 
robin-redbreasts and cedar-birds; with his genial, 
handsome host renewing his welcome in terms of 
unmistakable sincerity, it was easy enough for Archi- 
bald to make light of the fatigues and annoyance of 
the night just gone. All that had happened before 
reaching this hospitable shelter belong to the realm 
of uneasy dreams and homesick fancies. 

He had finished his toilet somewhat hastily, in re- 
sponse to Mr. Glen’s tap on the shutters of his room, 
which opened immediately upon the front gallery. 

I thought perhaps you would like to walk up to 
the stables before breakfast to look at your horse. 
Keuben got home about an hour after you went to 
bed and brought him along. He reports finding him 
on the road-side, pretty badly hobbled by his hitch- 
ing-rein.” 

‘‘ I shouldn’t care if he’d broken his treacherous 


u 


A JSTllANG^ PILGitIMAGB. 


neck I” said Murray, stepping back into the hall for 
his hat. 

“I hope you don’t bear malice,” said Mr. Glen, 
laughing. “ I don’t much blame the brute for scar- 
ing at those ghostly posts, coming on them for the 
first time in the night. We may as well take the 
glass, and I can introduce you to some of your con- 
stituents at long range.” 

He took down a long old-fashioned spy-glass from 
the rack in the hall and led the way toward the 
front gate, which lay at the end of a long walk, 
fianked by double rows of crape myrtle, then out 
upon the broad, grassy lawn that sloped gradually 
doAvn to the very water’s edge in velvet smoothness. 

“ What lovely situations you lake-dwellers all seem 
to have for your homes,” Archibald said, sweeping 
the view with admiring gaze. 

‘‘We think so. I was born right here, you know, 
and although I have traveled considerably, for a 
swamp planter, hanged if I’ve found a spot anywhere, 
Horth, South, East or West, that I would exchange the 
Homestead for. My wife’s almost as bad about it 
as I am. She’s lived here always, too. You see 
that chimney peeping up over the trees on the other 
side of the lake, up yonder to the north? Ho ; not 
the one with the green gate-posts. Here ; take the 
glass. How, then, the one with the long wooden- 
walk leading out to the boat-house. Yes? Well, 
that’s where Mrs. Glen’s folks live. Her father and 


A STMAIiGB PILOBIMAOE. 


75 


mother and a house full of children. You are likely 
to see enough of them. They are the sort that 
wants the doctor if baby scratches its own nose 
with its own nails. Mrs. Glen was born in that 
very house. A jolly old place it is, toa Mrs. Glen 
was a Martin.’’ 

Archibald next brought the glass to bear upon the 
green gate-posts. They were two or three miles dis- 
tant from the Martin mansion. A tiny little frame- 
cottage, all latticed about, sat back behind them. 
The lattice- work was painted the same vivid green 
as the gate-posts. It all looked very snug and trim. 

“ Whose wren’s nest is that behind the green gate- 
posts ?” he asked, without removing the glass. I 
like the look of it.” 

Mr. Glen laughed as he answered : 

“If you’re one of the gormandizing sort, that 
house behind the green gate-posts will become one 
of your favorite resorts. There’s where Bud Hunt 
lives. I’ll lay a wager Clayton’s written to him 
about you already. Bud’s a character. He knows 
hoAV to set a table, though. All the housekeepers in 
the country are envious of him. Confirmed old 
bachelor. Says it’s Thersie’s fault. You haven’t 
seen Thersie yet — my sister. Miss Glen. Bud began 
courting her when she came home from school for 
the holidays, and has kept it up annually ever since. 
Don’t see how he could round off the year without 
his “annual message,” I call it. Tip-top fellow, 


76 


1 

A STBAJ^GB PILGRIMAGE. 


Hunt. If lie hadn’t been left too weU oif, he’d have 
done something, maybe. Lots of brains. The next 
place,” noticing that Murray had changed the direc- 
tion of the glass once more, belongs to a lot of 
people who just serve to fill up chinks. You know 
the world has to have ballast of one sort or another. 
And next to that comes the Bemish place. Bemish 
is your predecessor.” 

Why my predecessor ?” Archie asked, lowering 
the heavy glass and returning it to his host. Cer- 
tainly a neighborhood like this ought to be able to 
support two physicians without injury to any one’s 
prospects. I should not like to feel like an usurper.” 

‘^My dear feUow,” said Mr. Glen soothingly, 
“ pray don’t get any of that nonsense in your head. 
For all practical purposes, old Bemish may as well 
have died and been buried two years ago. He tries 
to keep up, but it’s a dismal failure.” 

Health giving way ?” 

‘^Ho. To look at him you would say there were 
a good many years of usefulness ahead of . old 
man. He’s not more than sixty, perhaps less. But — 
well, I may as well tell you about Bemish first as 
last. You are going to hear liis story from some- 
body. It will serve to show you, too, how much we 
need another physician bore, and how little you 
will be of an interloper.” 

They had been walking slowly toward the stables 
while talldng. Meteor was brought out for his ma» 


A STJiAmM; PILGRIMAGE. 


“•viV 

r ( 


ter’s inspection and found to be none the worse for 
Lis escapade, barring a skinned spot on one leg. 

Mr. Glen led the way to a mounting-block on the 
road-side when the examination was concluded, and 
suggested they should sit there while he told Doc- 
tor Bemish’s story. Plenty of time before break- 
fast. Mrs. Glen and. Thersie are a little deliberate 
of mornings.” Then he entered upon his narrative. 

“ Bemish has had the entire practice of this neigh- 
borhood ever since I was a boy. In fact, he has 
never practiced anywhere else. Came here a strug- 
gling young doctor, about your age, but married 
into one of the wealthiest families on the lake 
before he’d been here a year. That place over yon- 
der was his wife’s. She didn’t live long. Died 
when their first child, a splendid boy, was about five 
or six years old. Bemish adored her and worshiped 
the boy. He never would allow him to go away to 
school. Beared him up right under his own nose. 
Had all sorts of tutors for him, but somehow none 
of them staid very long. George was a little too 
much for them, I guess. 

“Hot that he didn’t study. His father used to 
say they left when George had squeezed them dry 
and they hadn’t anything more to. offer him. The 
old man seemed perfectly satisfied with everything 
George did or left undone. They lived over there 
together, and when the doctor was off duty he de- 
voted himself to George’s culture. You can 


78 


A STHAJVaB PILGRIMAaE. 


imagine what sort of training the boy got. More 
money than was good for him; absolute liberty, 
and a doating father as his only restraint.” 

What a beast he must have turned out !” 

On the contrary, he was one of the most fascin- 
ating young fellows you ever saw. Even men felt 
the power of his gentleness, courtesy and affability. 
And as for the women ! W ell, when I tell you 
George Bemish was as handsome as Adonis, you can 
forecast their opinion. I believe Thersie was about 
the only girl in the parish that wasn’t ready to drop 
into his arms at the first word. But then we call 
Thersie ^ St. Ambrose’s Maiden of Snow.’ Bemish 
was a great beau in those days.” 

“ I notice you speak of Mr. Bemish in the past 
tense. Is he dead ?” 

“ That’s more than I can tell you. It would have 
been better for the old man if he had died when 
his mother did. He had full swing. Drove the 
fastest, wildest horses that ever were hitched to a 
pole, and was in for all that was going. Hobody 
ever saw George Bemish drunk, but when he mur- 
dered a poor little Erenchman, whom the doctor had 
imported in order to cram George for a European 
trip, in cold blood, the people were just ready to 
mob him. They would have done it, too — would 
have taken him out of jail and lynched him if he 
hadn’t escaped in some mysterious way and got out 
of the country,” 


A STJiAmi/ PILGUIMAGE. 


“ Do you suppose his father got him out ?” 

‘^Xo. You see at the time this thing occurred 
there wasn’t much else talked about for weeks, and 
we exhausted all our theories. I^o ; if the old man 
had gotten him out he would have cleared out with 
him. But he didn’t, which is all the proof we 
want that he doesn’t even know his son’s where- 
abouts. At first he just seemed to give up com- 
pletely. Lived at the jail ; had to be almost driven 
away. Everybody pitied the old man. He was a 
good man and a good doctor, and we have kept on 
sending for him, just as if nothing had ever hap- 
pened. But you see we’re getting afraid to depend 
on him.” 

Why was the guilt fastened on young Bemish so 
promptly? It doesn’t seem in keeping with the 
character you have described.” 

Doesn’t it ? 

“ Oh ! well, nobody else could have done it. Ho- 
body else had any motive. I’m not going to say the 
Frenchman wasn’t an infernal little nuisance — a 
conceited puppy that couldn’t look at a woman with- 
out offering to insult her. There’d been a fish-fry 
down by Bemish’s gate that day. Thersie went. 
Mrs. Glen and I didn’t. Thersie went with Hugh 
Maury. Mrs. Glen thinks they were engaged. I 
don’t know. It seems this little Frenchman made 
an extra fool of himself on that occasion, and Hugh 
said to George — they were the best sort of friends, 


90 


A BTRAmE PimRlMAGE, 


Hugh and George — ‘ that he was afraid lie would 
have to slap the Frenchman’s jaws before the day 
was over,’ and George said : ^ Just leave him to me ; 
I’ll fix him.’ When Lawyer Simonds inter vieAved 
him after the murder and reminded him of that re- 
mark he didn’t deny having said it, but said he had 
simply meant, in his capacity of host, to order him 
off the grounds. But the Frenchman was found 
dead that same evening just inside Bemish’s grounds, 
and an old Scotch gardener of the doctor’s swore to 
seeing George Bemish pull a knife from under the 
body and fling it as far as he could send it into the 
lake, after doing which he called on the gardener 
to help him carry the man to the house. You see 
there wasn’t any room for doubt.” 

“ Hot much. What a dastardlj^ scoundrel !” 

“Yes; and being the only murder that ever had 
been committed in the parish, it seemed to excite 
the neighborhood to a perfect frenzy of indignation. 
You see they felt as if they must do something to 
show that a man couldn’t ride rough-shod over the 
moralities and decencies of life just because he was 
a rich man’s son, and if George Bemish had not been 
sharp enough to break jail, I am afraid that some- 
thing would have occurred of a very serious nature. 
The old man’s case is really a pitiful one. Of course 
you will call on him ’ 

“ I suppose courtesy demands that much.” 

“ I think it does. Come ! I expect you are about 


A FlLGMiMAOM. 


81 


ready for your breakfast Mr. Glen rose from the 
carriage block, brushed the dust from his trousers, 
and swinging the spy-glass over his shoulders by its 
leathern strap, took the lead once more. 

Your lake is entrancing this morning.” Archie 
halted immediately in front of the gate to look once 
more out over the blue and rippling water. There 
were great patches of Minorca lily-pads afloat, on its 
bosom near the banks, their huge green discs each 
holding a sparkling diamond-drop at its heart. 
Archie’s delighted eyes wandered up and down the 
lonely sheet of water, resting Anally on a small 
circular island that presented an unbroken green 
cone of verdure to the sun’s rays. It scarcely 
covered more than two acres of space. 

“What do you caU that emerald gem down 
yonder ?” he asked, pointing it out to his host. 

“It goes by the name of Alligator’s Island. 
There’s a notion out that alligators are thicker about 
there than anywhere else in the lake. It belongs to 
the Bemish property, and I understand the old man 
has had a notice warning off trespassers stuck on all 
four sides of it. There’s not much call for that, as 
there’s nothing to tempt trespassers. It’s about as 
useless a piece of property as a body could well pos- 
sess. It’s just a cranky notion of the old man’s.” 

“ It’s a beauty spot, though.” 

“Yes, perhaps. By the way, Murray,” — they had 
passed inside of the gate by this time, and Archi- 


82 


A PlLOniMAGS. 


bald could see the trailing flounces of feminine gar- 
ments on the veranda through the thick shrubbery — 
“ I’ve one warning to utter. W e never speak of the 
Bemish tragedy before my sister. She was made 
unaccountably nervous by it at the time it happened. 
And then, when Hugh Maury left the neighborhood — 
some said it was because he felt he had innocently 
precipitated the tragedy — Thersie was really in a 
bad way. You see, I’m very candid, but then you’re 
going to be one of us, and I am opposed to useless 
mystification.” 

Doctor Murray turned and clasped his host’s hand 
warmly. 

I am with you, then. There is nothing on earth 
that excites my wrath and disgust more readily than 
mystery in the home circle.” 

They were at the foot of the front steps by this 
time, and there, standing, waiting to be introduced 
to the new doctor before passing into the breakfast- 
room, was Mrs. Glen, a tiny little Avoman with a 
frank, open face, a pair of fearless blue eyes, a mass 
of black hair, and no end of ribbons and laces on her 
morning-dress, Avhich trailed gracefully from her 
sloping shoulders as she came forward Avith a 
cordially extended hand. 

More sloAvly, Avith more of quiet dignity and an 
immense amount of shy reserve. Miss Glen followed 
her motions. She Avas quite tall, and about her head 
Avas coiled a mass of pale yelloAv hair. Her repose 


A STEAI^GE PILGRIMAGE. 


83 


almost amounted to languor. As she turned from 
him, after uttering some conventional words of wel- 
come her profile came into view. Archie started in- 
voluntarily, and then put from him violently the wild 
suspicion that had entered his fancy. 

He was assigned a place at the table immediately 
opposite Miss Glen. He was taking some pro- 
fessional notes of her excessive languor and pallor, 
when Mr. Glen betrayed him to the family. 

Thinli of Murray’s having to tramp across the 
fields last night afoot ! Horse threw him, and he 
had to find his way the best he could. I think he’d 
have shot the brute this morning if I hadn’t pleaded 
his case.” 

Annoyance at this exposure of his mishap was swal- 
lowed up in surprise at Miss Glen’s peculiar conduct. 
She had been conveying her coffee-cup to her lips 
when her brother made this bantering expose. The 
hand that held the cup trembled so that she replaced 
it in the saucer, its contents untasted. Her eyes 
were fastened on his face in mute, startled inquiry 
for a second. Then they fell before his steady gaze, 
and the pallor he had found so distressing, from a 
physician’s point of view, was suddenly displaced by 
rosy confusion. 

“ Evidently,” Archie said to himself, “ it has just 
this moment occurred to my lady that the man she 
passed last night was neither a stump nor a stray 
mule. Bah ! What is it to me if Mr, Glen’s hand- 


84 


A STBAJ^^GI^ PJLORIMAOE. 


some sister sees fit to hold tryst with gentlemen in 
the grave-yard 

Having settled it with himself that it was abso- 
lutely nothing to him, he joined in the laugh against 
himself composedly, increasing the mirth of his 
hearers by a terse account of his entire trip, but 
never once touching upon the detour he had made 
after entering the Homestead fields. For reasons 
of his own thdAfatixpas was suppressed. 

Theresa listened to him like one in a trance. She 
never once raised her eyes from her plate during the 
remainder of the meal. • Before it terminated she 
rose abruptly, and with a muttered apology, left the 
room. Mr. Glen looked across the table at his wife 
inquiringly. 

‘‘ Martha says Thersie had one of her bad nights 
again,” she said, answering the look. I’m afraid 
she wiU be Doctor Murray’s first patient.” 


A S7^JiAJS^a£; PILGRIMAGE. 


85 


) 

I CHAPTER VII. 

HETTY SEEKS TO SOLVE THE MYSTERY. 

I T WAS very rarely that Mrs. Ogden felt com- 
pelled to acknowledge herself baffled. She be- 
longed to that imperious type of womanhood that 
prefers martyrdom to exposure. She would rather 
have suffered the tortures of the Inquisition than ac- 
knowledge herself incapable of controlhng her own 
household. But circumstances had brought her to 
the point where the acknowledgment must be made. 
The especially trying feature of the case was that 
she had been baffled by the creature of all others 
who heretofore had been as wax in her hands — 
Hetty ! 

Hetty, who from having been one of the most 
cheerful, unselfish and malleable of creatures, had 
sunk into a condition of inexplicable sullenness, 
nervousness and gloom. It really was very trying 
to Mrs. Ogden, coming as it did at a time when she 
more than ever needed the girl’s strong common- 
sense aid in the management of the boys, who were 
fairly running wild in their newly enlarged sphere 
as country boys with space and possessions at their 
command. 


86 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


Something must be done with the hoys and for 
Hetty. She herself hajl never known, until Hetty’s 
supervision had Ireen relaxed, how heavily she had 
leaned upon the little thing to save her from the 
irksome responsibilities of controlling the boys and 
keeping them out of mischief. She had resolved to 
consult Doctor Yernon on the subject. She had not 
seen much of him since taking c(jntrol of the old 
place, for he was one of ‘^Arclii bald Murray’s ad- 
herents,” as she, in bitterness of soul, called all of the 
neighbors Avho showed even a tacit disapproval of 
the promptness with which she had taken possession 
of her brother’s property. Distasteful as Doctor 
Yernon Avas on this account, every one of her 
neighbors Avould be equally if not more so. 

She ‘Mog-eared” several sheets of good linen 
note-paper beyond redemption, as she absently 
curled the corners of them under her forefinger and 
thumb while trying to summon Doctor Yernon. It 
Avas not the mere summoning of him; but in order 
to explain to him Hetty’s peculiar state of body and 
mind, she Avould be compelled to tell him of the 
nerA^ous shock her daughter had received on the 
night of Mr. Dabney’s funeral. 

Hoav, to mention Parm^je Eose’s name Avould be 
to invite the doctor to refresh his memory touching 
some local episodes that she would much rather have 
forgotten. She wished Doctor Yernon had not 
been such a long-time resident of the neighborhood. 


A PILGBIMAGJS. 

But it could not be helped. She must consult 
him. 

Arrived at this conclusion, she dashed her note off 
rapidly enough, and dispatched it before she went 
to tell Hetty what she had done. 

Winter had come on apace. A light, dry snow 
lay in patches, like linen on a bleaching-lawn, all 
over the hill that sloped away from the house in 
every direction. The yellow and maroon chrysan- 
themums were frozen stiff, [and bent their icy crowns 
before the blast. 

It was easy enough to find Hetty. Every moment 
of the time not consumed by household duties, per- 
formed under compulsion, she spent in moody 
reverie over her own fire. She was sitting there at 
the moment her mother was writing to Doctor Yer- 
non about her, her feet planted on the low brass 
fender, her hands folded over an open book in her 
lap, her large eyes fixed immovably on the dancing 
flames made by the logs of cedar and pine, which 
filled her room with fragrance, light and warmth. 

The book upon which her hands lay folded was 
the small black quarto which old Lucy had put into 
her hands the night of the funeral. She had been 
going over its pages for the hundredth time, trying 
to discover the secret of its importance to her Cousin 
Archibald. That such a secret existed, no number 
of failures to detect it could make her doubt. She 
wished she had asked the old woman more about it. 


88 


A PlLOniMAOt}, 


She certainly would have done so had she known 
she was not to see her any more. Old Lucy had 
disappeared from the house-force before Hetty came 
out of her room the next morning. "When she had 
asked her mother about her, Mrs. Ogden had said 
that Lucy had asked permission to visit her children 
on the Creek Place, and as she was getting old and 
childish, she (Mrs. Ogden) had consented to have 
her put in charge of the day-nursery on the Creek 
Place. So she was not coming back. 

Hetty was aware that the property they had come 
into so suddenly included several plantations. 
Where the Creek Place was 'she did not have the re- 
motest idea, but she hoped old Lucy would be happy 
there among her children. Ho one seemed to think 
it worth their while here to tell her good-by. She 
wished they had come to the old place in summer, 
instead of winter. The old house was full of 
whispers and sighs and unaccountable noises. Her 
mother said it was the rats she heard in the wain- 
scoting, or the swallows up in the tall chimney, or — 
there it was again ! 

She sprang to her feet ; the book fell to the floor. 
She clasped her hands to her heart and stood listen- 
ing, with every nerve strained. Eats did not make 
so bold in midday. There was a slow, cautious 
sound of steps, apparently immediately over her 
head — a soft, stealthy tread, hke that of a beast 
in its lair. 


A SmAJSrGU PILGRIMAGE. 


89 


Then the muffled tones of ar voice now lifted in 
supplication, now lending i^elf to imprecation ! E'o 
words ! Only the distressed whisperings of a soul in 
travail. She was not hstening to it for the first 
time. It came to her whenever the room was still ; 
whenever she was alone ; more often at night than 
in the day ; loudest and oftenest just over the tall 
tester of her bed. She had told no one about it. 
There was no one to tell. If she told her mother 
she would call it nonsense, and perhaps move her 
to another room. She did not want that. There 
was no room in the whole of that big house where 
she could be as happy as just where she was. Up 
there in front of her, over her mantel-piece, hung a 
large oil-painting of her Cousin Archibald, taken 
perhaps just before he went off to study medicine. 
Such a good hkeness as it must have been of him, 
before the grief of hi^ uncle’s death and the surprise 
of their usurpation had robbed his face of that joy- 
ousness that made it so beautiful to poor little Hetty ; 
silly, loyal little Hetty, who had come to love that 
senseless piece of canvas so dearly. 

If she knew where he -was she would write and 
ask him if he did not want this picture, and the one 
of Uncle Richard, taken about the same time, sent 
after him. But never a line had come back to tell 
them where he was, or how he was succeeding, or 
anything. She did not blame him, not in the least ! 
There was no place in her heart where blame for 


90 


it^TRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


him could find lodgment. There was an old school- 
desk of his in one corner this room, too, full of a 
boy’s marvelous accumulation of things useful and 
useless, pretty and hideous. It had been unlocked 
when Hetty came into possession of this room. Ho 
one laid any special store by it or its contents. It 
was never unlocked now. The key to it went 
everywhere that Hetty went. It was on a ring 
with the rest of the keys to her private property. 
When she was not studying the book old Lucy gave 
her, it, too, reposed among the blotted copy-books, 
the cracked slates, the backless Latin grammars and 
the chipped marbles th&,t filled the old desk. The 
sounds overhead ceased. She drew a long breath of 
relief, stooped, and picking up the fallen book, put 
it back in the desk. Mrs. Ogden, coming in a little 
while later on, found her placidly working button- 
holes in a shirt for Bob. The black rings about the 
child’s eyes and the sad compression of her sweet 
lips caused her mother’s cold heart a severe pang. 

“ Hetty, my dear,” she said, sitting down by her 
close enough to clasp her with one arm, while she 
drew the sewing from her hands with the other, 
“ you sit too steadily. I must insist upon your taking 
more exercise. I have sent for Doctor Yernon to 
lay his orders upon you.” 

Hetty ■ looked at her in grave surprise. This 
solicitude was so entirely unexpected, but it was not 
upon her own wasting flesh or pale cheeks she 




A PlLGklMAGf^. 

expended much reflection. She answered almost 
petulantly : 

“ I don’t want nor need Doctor Y ernon, mother. T 
wish you had done nothing of the sort. How can I 
take exercise in such horrid weather ?” Then, 
without waiting for her mother to answer, she went 
on hurriedly : “ Mother, is there an upstairs to this 
house — an attic, I mean ?” 

Mrs. Ogden looked at her searchingly. What 
had such a childish question to do with the object in 
hand — her own health? Was Hetty’s mind totter- 
ing ? She answered lier, however, with readiness : 

“Certainly. You have been up there since we 
came. In the trunk-room. There is no other 
attic !” 

“.I want to go up there again, mother.” 

Mrs. Ogden rose with alacrity. She was in her 
most propitious mood. She looked at Hetty with 
amiable smiles: “We could not possibly have a 
better day for overhauling the trunks. The things 
have really never been properly aired since they 
were put up there. The sunshine must be stream- 
ing in at the dormer-windows right now. Come !” 

They went up together. This was not at all the 
sort of exploration Hetty had planned. She wanted 
the keys, which were at that moment lying in the 
soft, blue-velvet reticule suspended by a broad satin 
ribbon from her mother’s waist. She wanted to ex- 
plore every crevice of the old attic by herself, in her 


02 


A sTHAmEi pimniMAaR 


own fashion and at her leisure. She followed her 
mother’s brisk lead with listless acquiescence. 

The attic was an immense low-ceiled affair, filled 
with the accumulation of many generations. It 
extended from gable to gable, and was lighted by 
three immense dormer-windows let into the roof. 

You see,” said Mrs. Ogden, cheerfully doing the 
honors of the family dust-hole, “ it takes in all the 
space beneath the roof. If the boys were the sort of 
children that we were (Mrs. Ogden always spoke of 
Hetty as her own contemporary) this would be a 
splendid place to turn them loose in on a rainy day, 
but they would destroy more in half an hour than 
I could ever replace. I have to keep it locked 
against them. They are just getting beyond all 
bounds, since you’ve dropped their morning lessons. 
That’s one thing I want to see Doctor Yernon about. 
He knows everybody, and I want him to find me a 
tutor. Somebody must take those boys in hand.” 

Hetty was walking listlessly about the attic while 
her mother was talking. There was nothing un- 
usual about its construction. Its four plain, plastered 
walls had no other break in them than was neces- 
sary for the accommodation of the big dormer-win- 
dows. Against the rough plaster was hung an in- 
describable collection of things that to some one, 
at some time, may have had some significance, but 
certainly had none to the two women who were 
then examining them with indifferent eyes. The 


A STMAATG^ PlLGlilMAM. 


93 


broken furniture of many generations had been rele- 
gated to this hospital for incurables. Files of old 
musty newspapers festooned the walls. Eopes ran 
from corner to corner, laden with dust and antique 
garments. 

I think we may as well make a bonfire of that 
stuff,” said Mrs. Ogden, contemptuously indicating 
the pile of broken furniture. There’s not a piece 
of it that it would pay to cobble up.” 

That armoireP^ Hetty was looking at a heavy 
piece of mahogany furniture, brass-mounted and 
ancient, that stood at one end of the attic. Cer- 
tainly you wouldn’t burn that up !” 

That armoire is all right,” said Mrs. Ogden, 
placidly surveying the handsome antiquity, but it 
is something I do not feel at liberty to meddle with. 
I may as well give 3^ou its history now as any other 
time, so that in case you should find yourself alone 
in the attic you will not let your curiosity get the 
better of your discretion and tamper with it. Your 
Uncle Kichard once thought of getting married, as 
you know, and with that foohsh love of doing the 
handsome thing that got him into more than one 
scrape, he sent off and got what I suppose you 
might call a supplemental trousseau. Ho end of 
magnificent laces, shawls, silks and velvets are fall- 
ing to decay behind those mahogany doors. When 
the affair fell through, my poor brother had every- 
thing he had bought for his bride-elect locked up in 


04 


A PILQrIMAQ^. 


that armoire and put up here, threatening the most 
awful penalty if any one ever dared open those 
doors. 

“I am not very sentimental, and I confess it 
hurts me to think of things that would be so be- 
coming to you locked away in that senseless fashion. 
Perhaps, when we go out of moulding, I will muster 
the courage to unlock those doors, but hot now, not 
now !” 

Hetty looked at her mother steadily while she 
Avas making this explanation, and Avithout a Avord of 
comment she turned and left the attic. Mrs. Ogden 
hastily made the tour of the place and folloAved her, 
reaching the loAver hall just in time to see Doctor 
Yernon laboriously dismounting from his buggy 
upon the loAvest step. lie had come promptly, in 
obedience to her someAvhat urgent summons. The 
distance Avas not great, but the doctor’s years Avere 
many. 

His bntire Avillingness to diagnose Miss Ogden’s 
case Avas unavailing. She could not be found. Mrs. 
Ogden dispatched messengers in several directions 
over the grounds to bring her back to the house. 
During their absence she poured her other troubles 
into Doctor Yernon’s patient, if not sympathetic, 
ears. He had been friend and physician to the Dab- 
ney family ever since this handsome remnant of it 
had been a round-cheeked girl — 3^ounger than the 
one he had just been called in to physic. He could 
not turn a deaf ear to a Dabney. 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


95 


Mrs. Ogden’s other trouble was the boys. The 
doctor quite agreed with her as to the gravity of the 
situation. He stroked his gray beard reflectively, 
while she was giving the latest instances of reckless- 
ness and contumacy on Eob’s and Lem’s parts. 

“ If you are willing to trust my judgment as to 
whether a man is a gentleman or not, I should say 
I had just the sort of man you want, sitting in my 
buggy, holding ^the reins. I call him my medical 
student. I picked him up on the road-side one day 
last week. He is poor, that’s evident, but he is well 
educated.” 

Picked him up on the road-side ?” 

Literally ! Came very near running over him. 
He was sitting on a stump, just there in the Avoods 
Avhere my road turns off so short, you know, and he 
gave my horses a confounded scare. I pulled up Avith 
a vieAv to blessing him roundly, and baAvled out to 
knoAV Avhat he Avas doing there. He ansAvered so 
coolly, ^ Heading Ovid, sir !’ that he got my curiosity 
excited. I did not believe he Avas reading Ovid, 
though he did have it open in his hand. I believe 
the felloAV Avas resting because he was starved out 
and couldn’t take another step. I talked Avith him 
about ten minutes, and Avound up by telling him to 
climb up in the buggy and go home Avith me. He’s 
a gentleman, and an educated one at that. I Avas 
just keeping him because I found him interesting, 
ancl I’m sort of lonely noAV, since Dick Dabney’s 


96 


A STBANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


gone the old man’s voice fell to a tender pitch. 
“Wife and I are getting to be stupid company for 
each other.' This chap talks like a book, and says he 
wants Avork. You might try him. You know he 
could come over every morning — walk across the 
fields. I shouldn’t advise domesticating him here. 
He seems to have had a stunning blow of some sort. 
He’s evidently in trouble.” 

“ Why, if he is such a gentleman, shouldn’t he be 
domesticated here ?” Mrs. Ogden asked, thriftily bent 
upon striking a bargain with this distressed Avay- 
side savant. 

“ Too good-looking. He couldn’t hurt the boys, 
but Hetty ” 

“ Bah ! Call your young man in. I think I Avill 
risk Hetty. If he appears capable of teaching those 
terribly unruly boys of mine. I’ll take care of the 
romantic part.” 

Doctor Yernon left the parlor to summon the 
young man into Mrs. Ogden’s presence. He came 
back in a feAv moments, leaning on the arm of a tall, 
poAverfully built youth, Avhom he introduced as — 
Mr. Hugh Maury. 


A 3TJiAJ}ra£: PILGUmAa^, 


9^ 


CHAPTEK YIII. 


THE STORY FINDS A HERO. 



OCTOR YERlSTOISr had no notion of assisting 


Mrs. Ogden in her bargain-driving with his 
needy protege. Having formally introduced “Mr. 
Hugh Maury to Mrs. Ogden,’’ he withdrew, with 
the words : 

“ When you’ve finished your talk with Mrs. Ogden, 
Maury, walk down to that point on the river I drew 
your attention to as we came through the gate. I 
want you to see the water-view from that promon- 
tory. Finest thing of its sort in the county. I’ll 
drive down and wait for you there.” 

Then to Mrs. Ogden : 

“ It’s scarcely worth while waiting on Hetty any 
longer, I suppose. If she has made up her mind not 
to materialize, she won’t do it, I imagine.” 

“ Such conduct is not at all like Hetty,” Mrs. Og- 
den said plaintively. “ I am sure she needs treat- 
ment badly, doctor.” 

“ We’ll have to set a trap for her. When you’ve 
caged her I’ll treat her,” the doctor answered, tak- 
ing his hat from the chair next to him and leaving 


A PiLGRtMAQR 


the room with the slow deliberation necessitated by 
superflous flesh and' multiplying years. 

But there was a great big, soft heart hid away 
under the doctor’s manifold chest-wrappings. He 
and Eichard Dabney had grown up side by side on 
adjoining plantations. Almost every summer day 
had found them together, either smoking their pipes 
peacefully on his gallery, or else settling the affairs 
of the nation, with harmless acrimony, out upon the 
promontory, where the fickle breezes always blew 
freshest. There, with contradiction on their lips, 
but amity in their hearts, they would wile away 
hour after hour of precious time with childish disre- 
gard of its value. 

He had a fancy to visit the old bench under the 
oak-tree once more. He missed ‘‘ Dick ” so dismally 
yet. It would be almost like communing with him 
there. He would scarcely have ventured to indulge, 
this heart-impulse, save under cover of a desire to 
show the stranger within its gates the most beauti- 
ful feature of the Dabney estate. He drove slowly 
down the slippery, sloping hill-side road to the level 
plateau that lay at its feet and spread to the river’s 
bank. Here, turning the buggy so as to get the 
wintry wind at its back, the old man folded his fur- 
gloved hands over the lap-robe and waited patiently 
for his guest. 

Back there in the parlor, Hugh Maury was saying 
to Mrs. Ogden, in a straightforward fashion that 
did him decided credit ; 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


99 


I should like very much, madam e, to accept the 
situation you offer me on 3 mur own terms, but I 
think I ought to tell ^mu that I may want to drop it 
at a moment’s notice. Somewhere on the face of 
this earth, I do not know where, a man is wander- 
ing — if, indeed, he is not dead — an exile from his 
home and friends, because of a wrong done by m>e. 
I am searching for him. When I find him, I shall 
carry him home in triumph. I follow every clew 
that chance puts into my hands to its furthest 
end — so far, only to find myself further astray each 
time. But 1 will never desist! JSTever!” 

A strange pilgrimage 1” Mrs. Ogden murmured. 

“Yes, it is a strange pilgrimage. God grant that 
it does not prove to be a hopeless one. I have not 
told m\^ good friend Doctor Yernon anything of 
this. Ilis taking me under his roof was an eccentric 
exhibition of benevolent hospitality that laid me 
under no obligations save the one of gratitude. 
Here it is different. You propose to put young and 
unformed minds in mjr charge. I tell you candidly, 
madame, that if I did not want the money with 
which to pursue my search I should probably de- 
chne your offer on the spot. As it is, I say, if, after 
what I have told you, you are willing to intrust 
3 mur boys to me for a few months, I think I 
can promise that neither their minds nor their 
morals shall suffer from tho tutelage of ^ most un- 
happy man,” 


100 


A STEAmE PILGEIMAOE. 


Mrs. Ogden’s answer may not have been dictated 
by the finest sense of delicacy, but it was conclusive 
so far as closing the interview and securing a 
temporary disciplinarian for the boys. 

‘‘Your story certainly is a queer one, but I’m just 
desperate, and I do believe, in spite of the deed for 
which you seem to suffer such keen remorse, that 
you will act the gentleman as long as you are under 
my roof. I am a widow. My family consists of 
three very unruly boys and one daughter — young 
and extremely pretty I” She laid special emphasis on 
the adjective devoted to Hetty, and fixed her hand- 
some eyes scrutinizingly, almost threateningly, on 
his face. 

“ Madame, the three unruly boys and mademoi- 
selle, alike, will be objects of respectful interest to 
me,” he answered, holding his handsome head as 
haughtily as her own. 

“You are from Louisiana?” Mrs. Ogden said 
abruptly. 

A dark flush mounted swiftly upward in Maur3^’s 
face. This keen-eyed woman might prove more of 
an inquisitor than he cared to qncounter daity. 

“ Yes. Madame is a keen observer. She has de- 
tective talents.” 

“Hot that I know of. But your ‘ Madame ’ and 
‘ Mademoiselle ’ sounded Frenchy, you know. And 
then, you look like a Creole, with your intensely 
black hair and eyes and mustache and your olive 


A STRANOE PILGRIMAGE. 101 

skin. I want you to bring the boys on as fast as 
possible in French while you do stay.” 

‘‘ While I do stay I shall spare no pains to give 
entire satisfaction in every particular,” the new tutor 
said, standing respectfully before her, hat in hand. 
“ I think now I will rejoin my friend Doctor Yer- 
non, if madame will excuse me.” 

Mrs. Ogden graciously accompanied him as far as 
the front door. She liked him, and she had gotten 
him cheap. Mrs. Ogden always esteemed those 
things most highly for which she expended the least 
cash. 

‘‘Well, then, I shall expect you to move over to- 
morrow with your trunk. Oh ; yes ! I forgot.” 
Hugh’s violent blush caused her to amend. “You 
are taking a pedestrian tour. Your bag, or your 
bundle, then. And I wish, by the way, when you 
join Doctor Yernon down there on the Point — 
there ! you can see the top of his buggy from here — 
you would ask him to drive up to the door again, 
before going home. Hetty certainly ought to be in 
the house by that time.” 

But it was becoming unsafe to predicate Hetty’s 
movements upon what she ought to do. She ought 
to have gone docilely into the parlor and submis- 
sively stuck her tongue out for Doctor Yernon’s 
inspection, and assisted him in diagnosing her case 
by describing her physical sensations unscientifically 
and minutely. She was quite well aware of his 


102 


A STRAATGE PILGRIMAGE. 


presence in the house, when, jerking her cloak and 
hood from the hall-rack, she had fled precipitately, 
desperately bent upon avoiding this senseless and 
useless ordeal. She knew better than a whole col- 
lege of physicians and surgeons could tell her where 
her own trouble lay. Mystery — a thing so foreign to 
her sweet, pure nature, that she recoiled from it 
instinctively — had been crowding upon her, and en- 
veloping her in even thicker and more impenetrable 
folds ever since the day of her arrival in this house. 
Her uncle’s home was growing more hateful to her 
every hour she spent under its roof. The key 
which mad Parmelie Pose had left in her possession 
refused to fit into any key-hole among her uncle’s 
possessions. She never lost an opportunity to give 
it a surreptitious trial. If that key and that book 
were holding between them the secret of anything 
that would mend matters for her Cousin Archibald, 
she owed it to him, defrauded and banished, to pluck 
it from them. 

The obligation to fathom this mystery weighed 
upon her like an incubus. 

Old Lucy might have helped her, but her mother 
had banished her to a far-away plantation. Par- 
melie Pose, if properly approached, might still do so ; 
but her mother assured her that the unfortunate 
creature, whom she had last seen standing white and 
ghostly on the moonlit lawn, was once more safely 
under lock and key. 


A STMAITM PILGRIMAGE. 


103 


Her imagination worked unhealthily and with 
preternatural activity in the still loneliness of the 
big house, which presented such a grand contrast to 
the stuffy little home in Pittsburg, where the air 
had always seemed full of hurry and noise, and the 
boys permeated the atmosphere perpetually with a 
healthy prosaic element before which every vaporous 
fancy fled affrighted. 

Here she piled fancy upon fancy, intensifying each 
unexplained sound or sight into a mystery tenfold 
greater than any that actually enfolded her. She 
had made many a fruitless trip to the bench under 
the leafless oak, hoping, hoping, hoping that Par- 
melie Pose might suddenly once more come climbing 
up the tangled foot-path and either take back the 
key that tortured her, as Blue Beard’s key tortured 
Fatima, or else tell her what to do with it. But it 
had been months now since that morning on which 
so much had happened had come and gone — the 
morning when her Cousin Archibald had kissed her 
and gone away from her 1 ^ 

And all that she had suffered and pondered and 
vexed her heart and soul over since, her mother 
wanted to reduce to dyspepsia for the doctor’s dis- 
cussion and physicking ! She would not submit to it ! 
She sped along the icy hill-slope toward the prom- 
ontory, her red cloak making a bright spot against 
the patches of snow, her eyes bright with de- 
fiance. She could see far away across the river now, 


104 


A STBANGB PILGRIMAGE. 


through the leafless branches of the trees. She 
could see a large, gray, unpainted house, sitting far 
back in a weedy garden. It was in that direction 
that Parmelie Pose had disappeared when she 
climbed the other bank on that morning. Perhaps 
she lived there ! Perhaps there was some one on the 
other side of that narrow ice-locked stream that 
could tell her more about this woman, who seemed 
to have taken a life-and-death grip on her imagina- 
tion and her energies. She could see the smoke 
curling from the chimney of the old ferry-man’s 
cabin. But there was no boat in the water at its 
foot now. Navigation was suspended for miles 
above and below the Dabney place. A solid sheet 
of ice spread from banli to bank. The boys had 
been boasting of the skating for weeks past. She, 
too, could skate ! Some sudden impulse sent her 
hurrying from the Point, whei'e she had been idly 
looking out over the frozen landscape with her cold 
hands locked under her bright cloak, downward 
along the steep foot-path that led to the river. She 
went with reckless speed. Something might happen 
to frustrate her newborn plan. She clutched the 
frozen branches of the bushes as she descended, to 
keep her from pitching head foremost. If the boys 
had only been faithful to their life-long system of 
carelessness, she should find a pair of skates waiting 
for her somewhere about the bank below. She was 
not disappointed. There were four pair lying on 


A STHANOB PILORIMAGE. 


105 


the bank, thrown pell-mell where the skaters had 
flung them off after last using them. 

What was to hinder her crossing ? She had 
always been proud of her skill in skating, but had 
never thought to put it to any practical use. It was 
late — too late to think of climbing the hill on the 
opposite side to-day, but she would extract all there 
wms to learn about Parmelie Rose from the old man 
who had ferried her across that day. And she could 
insure his coming for her — Hetty — on some future 
day, when she might want to visit that house behind 
the leafless trees, in case that really was the mad 
woman’s home. It took her but a second of time to 
buckle the skates securely upon her daring little 
feet. Another second and she was out upon the 
ice I 

Old Isham, reluctantly rising, with his ax in his 
hand, to obey his wife’s peremptory demand for 
more flre-wood, opened his front door, raised one 
hand to his eyes with a gesture of surprise, and then 
called excitedly to his wife, who was comfortably 
smoking her black pipe in the chimney corner. 

‘‘ In de name of won’erment. Cicely, come yere 
an’ tells me w’at you meks outer dis !” 

Cicely came promptly, and stood looking out over 
his shoulder, quite mute after one violently ejected : 

De lawd !” 

The banks on the Dabney side of the little stream 
were precipitous bluffs, now clothed with ioe-clad 


106 ^ STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 

shrubs from crown to foot. Against this dazzling, 
glittering background a brilliant object was speed- 
ing toward the old people in the cabin-door. It was 
Hetty, her smooth cheeks aflame with color, her 
long black braids swaying wdth the graceful motions 
of her slender form, as with folded arms she sped 
straight toward her goal — the cabin door. 

The exercise had done her good. The sense of 
achievement elevated her spirits. She laughed 
merrily at the two wondering but kindly old faces 
in the door, stooped to disencmnber her feet of the 
skates, and walked rapidly toward them. 

“ I am Hetty — Mrs. Ogden’s daughter, from across 
the river. I have come to see you.” 

Isham touched his gray forelock. He left it to 
Cicely to do the honors. She was not behind him 
in courtesy. The hem of her short, blue cotton 
dress came in sudden and fleeting contact with the 
floor. 

“ You’s twicet welcome, Missy; but you’s done a 
mouty darin’ thing, honey. Me was scaret fur 
you.” 

The ice is firm. I know how to skate very well, 
and I wanted to talk to Uncle ” 

Hetty paused courteously. 

Isham,” the old man said, clutching his forelock 
again. 

“ Isham,” Hetty went on, about a lady he rowed 
over to our place on the day of my uncle’^ funeral,” 


A STj^A^jE; pilgrimage. 10 ^^ 

“ Miss Eose !” the old people answered, in awed 
concert. 

‘‘Yes. Miss Parmelie Pose. "Where does she 
live ?” 

Isham shook his head mournfully, as Cicely an- 
swered : 

“ What you pesterin’ ’bout Miss Eose for, chile ? 
She cyan do you no good, nor no harm, nuther, 
now.” 

“ Is she dead ?” 

“ Not dead, but lock up ag’in. She jus’ git out — ■ 
de Lord on’y know how, dat time — an’ ’sist upon de 
ol’ man tekin’ she ’c-rost de river de day Mars’ Dab- 
ney was bmy. We b’longs to Miss Eose. She our 
Miss’, you know.” 

“ But where does she live ?” 

“ Dat her house. Missy, you see b’hin’ de trees. 
She live thar, ef she can be said to live anywhar. 
She lock up in a room in that ve’y house this minit.” 

“ Who lives with her ?” 

“Mars’ John.” 

“ Who is ‘Mars’ John V ” 

“ One uv de Lord's own — Miss Eose’s Drudder. 
Mars’ John don’ live fur nothin’ but t’ tek keer uv 
that poo’ chile.” 

Hetty stood silently warming her hands in front 
of the wood-fire in the cabin. She had accomplished 
all she had hoped to accomplish that morning. She 
must get back home before her escapade was discov- 


loa 


A PILGRIMAGE. 


ered and all chance of repeating it prevented. She 
was ashamed of the nervous disinclination she felt 
for the return trip. 

‘‘ Does the river remain frozen over this way long 
at a time, Uncle Isham ?” she asked presently. 

Uot long, honey. It ain’t none too firm now 
long ’bout de middle. I wisht you hadn’t riskt it, 
Missy.” 

I found that much out when I was crossing. But 
I am very light. It doesn’t take much to hold me 
up. I want you to promise me, when you see a blue 
silk handkerchief waved from the Point, that you 
will come over right quick. Uncle Isham — when it 
gets so you can run your boat again, I mean. And 
to show you how much in earnest I am about it, I 
will pay you in advance. I tied fifty cents up in my 
handkerchief for you.” 

Old Isham’s horny hand closed promptly over the 
piece of silver, and he promised fervently to hold 
himself in readiness to obey her signal. The old 
people followed her to the water’s edge with anxious 
faces and many objurgations to be keerful. Spe- 
cially ’long uv de middle.” 

She laughed, flung them a merry farewell with 
one hand and launched herself once more, gracefully 
and skillfully, upon the frozen current, quite. Uncon- 
scious that she was being watched by two pair of 
masculine eyes from the Point on the other side. 

Hugh IMaury had just been sweeping the opposite 


A PILORTMAGE. 


109 


bank with the field-glass — without which the doctor 
never traveled — when she launched herself. 

‘‘ Is your river a good skating-rink he asked, 
watching the girl’s graceful motions without aid of 
the glass. 

Perhaps close along shore,” the doctor answered, 
from his seat in the buggy. ‘‘No one has ever at- 
tempted to cross it, I imagine.” 

“ If I mistake not, some one is about to attempt it. 
A young girl is out on the ice, who seems to be mak- 
ing directly for this shore.” 

Doctor Yernon clambered hastily down, and joining 
him, seized the glass excitedly, holding it for a sec- 
ond only ; then his arm dropped as if paralyzed. 

“ Hetty Ogden ! Is the child insane ? My God ! 
is there no way to get to her ? Can’t she see there’s 
a thaw on ?” 

He was familiar with the downward path, but it 
held perils for his aging feet. He silently pointed 
it out to Maury, who bounded down it like a 
chamois, with no distinct idea save that of getting 
nearer to the imperiled skater. She had come to a 
halt, and was looking down in terror at a crack which 
had yawned in the ice since her crossing. Her cheeks 
blanched, and she filing up her arms in despair. 

“ Stand still ! Perfectly still !” 

It was a command, hurled across the ice at her in 
a voice she had never heard before. She obeyed it, 
however, instinctively. It took Hugh but a half- 


110 


A &mAm^ piK^niMA&R 


second to invest himself in the largest pair of skates 
on the bank. What then ? He was no expert. His 
home in semi-tropical Louisiana gave no encourage- 
ment to this graceful accomplishment. He had ven- 
tured on the rollers alone. Would that slender 
knowledge avail him in this terrible emergency? 

Hetty watched his motions with sickening anxiety. 
He was slow and clumsy. His good intentions were 
no less apparent. He would only drown himself in 
attempting to aid her. She looked at the widening 
crack. She could leap it and reach solid ice once 
more. It was her one chance. 

Old Isham, standing trembling and powerless in 
his cabin-door ; Doctor Yernon, standing trembling 
and powerless on the snow-covered Point; Hugh 
Maury, straining every nerve to reach her before 
the w^orse should befall, saw her lift her dainty 
skirts wdth both hands and leap ! 

There was a flash of bright red against the glit- 
tering ice ! A dark, yawning hole ! A choked cry ! 
Troubled waters ! Stillness ! 


A STBAA^'G^^ PILGMIMAGE, 


111 ' 


CHAPTEK^IX. 

HUGH MAUKY’s STKANGE PILGRIMAGE. 

E YEKY one was talking of the miracle per- 
formed by Mrs. Ogden’s tutor in rescuing her 
daughter from a hole in the ice, regaining the shore, 
and climbing the steep, frozen foot-path with her in- 
sensible form flung across his shoulder. Every one 
wanted to see the man who, without any previous 
heralding, had come among them to make sudden 
display of such muscular heroism ; so that instead 
of harboring a seedy savant, kept humble by a sense 
of friendliness, Mrs. Ogden found herself with a 
veritable lion in hand. 

Maury himself could never tell exactly how he 
made that last desperate plunge forward, grasped 
the floating ends of a crimson cloak, and, bringing 
Hetty to the surface, struggled under her weight 
until he laid her in the doctor’s buggy and saw the 
old man drive rapidly off with her toward the 
house. 

Then he had time tp think of his own chilled and 
stiffening limbs. A brisk walk across the sun-bathed 
fields to Doctor Yernon’s house, however, completely 
restored his comfort, and there he remained until 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


/ 

/ 


112 


summoned once more to the Dabney place by a 
formal note from Mrs. Ogden, written, evident!^, 
under the impression that it would not be well to 
dwell too long on the romantic episode of Hetty’s 
rescue. 

“ Young people are such fools!” she had said to 
herself, while holding her sealing-wax in the taper’s 
flame, before sealing this note. ‘‘ If I were to say 
much more on that subject he would be wanting to 
marry the girl off-hand.” 

The injuries sustained by the reckless heroine of 
this escapade were such as to necessitate close con- 
finement indoors, principally within the bounds of 
her own room. This was all the better for Mrs. 
Ogden’s purposes. It was Avell Hetty and the boys’ 
tutor should see little of each other until after the 
romance of this thing had become stale and Avorn 
itself out. 

Mrs. Ogden Avasted a large proportion of her 
time in guarding against the most unlikely possibili- 
ties. Hetty Avas sitting up, enveloped from head to 
foot in flannels, thinking dismally of the long con- 
finement ahead of her, Avhen Mrs. Ogden informed 
her, in a casual sort of way, that the boys’ teacher 
had come. 

Teacher ? Why, Avhere did you pick up a teacher 
so suddenly ? I Avas just thinking, Avhile I had to 
sit here like a mummy, I might try the boys again ; 
but they are so unmanageable.” 


A PIZOmilAGB. 113 

^‘Yes. They’ve gotten quite beyond you. They 
need a man. The young man you put to such in- 
convenience the other day is the person I had en- 
gaged. He comes over this Aorning. By the way. 
I have been very patient in this matter. Do you 
knoAv you have never yet explained to me your be- 
ing on the ice that day 

‘‘ I did not Avant to see Doctor Yernon. You said 
I must take more exercise. I found Bob’s skates on 
the river-bank. I know how to skate very well, and 
the ice looked as firm as a rock.” 

Hetty’s ansAver was someAvhat disjointed and en- 
tirely unsatisfactory. 

“ Looked firm ! I Avish you Avould learn that you 
are a young lady, Hetty, and as the oldest daughter 
of my house have a certain position to maintain. It 
was a A^ery fast performance for you.” 

“ What is the teacher’s name ?” Hetty asked, 
holding her blue-veined hands close to the flames. 

I suppose I’ll have to thank him for getting Avet in 
my behalf.” 

“ His name is Maury. Heaven knoAvs he’s been 
thanked often' enough ! I’ve exhausted myself !” 

‘^s he old ?” 

‘‘Ho ; he is young.” 

“ That is a pity.” 

“Why ?” 

“ Because I think an old man, and a very stern 
one, Avould be the best for the boys. Ugly ? You 


114 


A STJiAJVGJS; PILGRIMAGE. 


know I have not the remotest idea how my rescuer 
looks — could not even have told if he were a white 
man or a black.” 

Mrs. Ogden reluctantly admitted that the tutor 
was far from being ngly. Hetty laughed at her 
dissatisfied tones as she accorded him an unusual 
share of good looks. 

He isn’t conceited, is he, on the strength of his 
‘‘ Spanish eyes ” and ‘‘ French profile 

“Ho. At present he is a very modest, well- 
behaved young fellow.” 

“ But you don’t think it will last ?” 

“ I am afraid not.” 

“AYhy, mother? You knoAv you are given to 
forecasting unpleasant possibilities.” 

“Well, people do make such fools of themselves 
over a man that shows an ounce of pluck. Every 
one that calls at the door to inquire for you must 
be furnished with every particular about the new 
man. They all want to see him. If he’d killed the 
sea-serpent, or exterminated the Indians, or built the 
Pyramids, he couldn’t be an object of greater curi- 
osity.” 

“ That’s a tribute to our family importance,” said 
Hetty with ironical emphasis. “Why not give a 
dinner-party, and put your lion on exhibition to en- 
tertain the company. That would be an easy way 
of satisfying public curiosity.” 

“Do you know that woiddn’t be a- bad idea!” 


A STnAAtGE pilgrimage. 


115 


Mrs Ogden grasped the idea with avidity. 

Hetty was vaguely aware that her mother had 
not been received into the old neighborhood with 
open arms. This thought had intruded itself among 
her other distresses. It must be that everybody felt 
the property belonged by rights to her Cousin Ar- 
chibald. Her suggestion of a formal dinner-party 
had been made in pure irony. She shrank from its 
execntion with distaste. 

“ You don’t mean it, mother ?” 

“ I do !” Mrs. Ogden grew more positive every 
moment. “ Your Uncle Kichard has been dead now 
for nea'rly five months. It will be a good way to 
find out who is for us and who against us.” 

Why should any one be ‘ against us,’ mother ?” 

Because,” Mrs. Ogden answered, with an angry 
flashing of her handsome eyes and a bitter com- 
pression of her full, red lips, there are some people 
idiotic enough to think that I ought to have staid 
away from the house I was born and reared in, and 
let Archibald Murray turn it into a bachelor’s hall 
and headquarters for revelers. Because — oh ” 

Oh, mother !” 

By the wa}^, speaking of that young man,” 
Mrs. Ogden opened the velvet reticule swung to her 
belt and peered into its interior, “ I got a letter from 
Archibald this morning. Hot much of a letter, 
either. He said just as little as he could decently 
say. Eegards to you, I believe. Wants all the 


116 


A STJiAA'G^ pilgrimage. 


books with his name in them forwarded to some 
place in Louisiana.” She drew the strings of the 
reticule firmly together once more. “ I thought the 
letter was in here, but it seems it is not. I wonder 
who he thinks is going to take the trouble to pick 
out and pack up all the books his name is in, and 
send them after him 

I will,” said Hetty, not looking at her mother, 
but fixing her serious eyes, which seemed to have 
caught the glow and the warmth of the brightest 
flame before her, on the fire. “ I hope you have not 
lost the address, mother.” 

“ I guess not.” Mrs. Ogden made a swift, mental 
note to the effect that so long as the girl nursed a 
foolish fancy for her exiled and invisible cousin, she 
was in less danger from Hugh Maury’s pensive eyes 
and tragic beauty, and, with the diplomacy which 
never deserted her, she concluded to utilize it. ‘‘ It 
may furnish you occupation, since you can’t get out- 
doors, and you can do it very gradually, you know. 
I will find the letter, and give it to you to keep until 
the books are ready to be shipped. But to return to 
that suggestion of the dinner.” 

I was only jesting, mother.” 

‘‘But I am not I I don’t intend you shall be 
buried here without any associates of your own sex 
and age. I must invite the Chaplains !” Here 
Mrs. Ogden’s enthusiasm carried her to the extent 
of demanding a paper-pad and pencil, by whose aid 


A STMAiTGE PILOnnlAGB. 


11 ? 


she rapidly jotted down a dozen or two names. I 
sha’n’t have it until the doctor is quite willing for 
you to participate, for I mean you shall make a 
good impression on these people. I hate them, I 
hate them every one, but they shall not ignore the 
fact that a Dabney is still at the head of this house. 
There’s no end of preliminary labor to go through. 
There’s the silver dinner-service — your Uncle Dick 
never used it. So hard to keep in order, I suppose. 
I’ve got that to overhaul ; and the wine-cellar — I 
haven’t given it a thought since we came. Dear 
me, I quite enjoy the stirring-up incident on getting 
ready. Certainly you won’t be more than a week 
getting over this horrid cold. I can’t sit here all 
morning, though. I believe I feel as if such a load 
was taken off me by knowing that the boys are 
shut up with Mr. Maury in the school-room that I 
forget I have anything else left to do. I’ll go right 
now and talk the whole matter over with Almira.” 
Mrs. Ogden’s spirits grew more exuberant mo- 
mentarily. 

Almira was the cook. There was no stemming 
the tide now. It carried Hetty back to the dreary 
town-life in Pittsburg when an invitation to dinner 
or a ball had been sufficient to throw her mother 
into a flutter of girlish excitement all day — turbu- 
lent, iU-regulated, wasted days, when the boys knew 
it was safe to ask any indulgence at a time when 
their mother would grant anything to keep them 


m 


A STMmB PILGPJMA^R 


out of the way ; when she, Hetty, had vibrated be- 
tween the stores and her mother’s bed-room all day 
with little paper parcels — perhaps a bit of lace, or 
an artificial flower, or a fine handkerchief, or a new 
pair of light kid gloves. She could never remember 
an invitation finding her mother in a state of 
preparation. Something always had to be bought, 
something always to be mended, and a great deal 
always to be condoned. Then the long, stupid 
evenings that she, Hetty, had yawned through alone, 
with the tired boys all asleep in bed upstairs, with 
the street sounds growing fainter and fewer until 
it seemed as if she, alone, in a whole townful, were 
left to watch and wait ! It could never be quite so 
bad again, she hoped and believed. Out if this 
somberly retrospective view she was aroused by a 
chilly sensation, as if a door softly opened at her 
back. She turned about in her chair hastily. The 
doors were all closed, and the long stufi curtains 
dropped over the windows. A sigh, twice repeated, 
fell distinctly on her ears ; then the room grew warm 
again, and she heard the soft, stealthy tread that 
had bewildered and terrified her tune and again 
since she had occupied this room. 

Why should these sounds only come to her when 
she was alone in her room ? Why should they come 
to her when the bright sunshine was flooding the 
earth outside, and the old house instinct with life 
and vitality ? Who was it that was singling her out 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


119 


for these eerie visitations without making clear the 
object of them ? W as it because she had remained 
so stupidly unresponsive, showing only that abject, 
animal fear which flesh-hampered cowards display 
toward the disembodied spirits of their nearest and 
dearest friends! Who knew but it might be her 
Uncle Uichard trying to tell her something to do for 
her Cousin Archibald? She stood up and faced 
toward the spot whence the chilly breath had seemed 
to come. Her heavy w^rappings fell from about her ; 
her long hair, which had not known the bondage of 
comb or hairpin since her confinement at her own 
fireside, fell about her in inky waves. Her little 
hands were clasped imploringly 1 Perhaps she could 
woo this visitant from the other world to come 
again by showing herself fearless and ready. She 
would deal with it as with a kindly, earthly friend, 
who had somewhat to say. 

Uncle Kichard!” — it seemed so strange to be 
addressing him audibly ! He, whom she had never 
seen in the flesh ! — if it is you who come to me, 
having a message for the one you loved so dearly 
here on earth, speak, as best you can, and I will try 
with these dull ears of flesh to comprehend.” 

Her sweet face was lighted up with the intense 
earnestness of the soul within. She stood with her 
head slightly forward, her lips apart, her hands 
clasped, entranced 1 a beautiful incarnation of fear- 
lessness and faith! Ho voice spoke unto voice. 


A PILGRIMAGE. 


120 

Only that soft, stealthy tread which presently died 
away entirely, leaving her bewildered and exhausted. 
The stillness of the room terrified her after her sud- 
den transition from the exaltation of the previous 
moment. Even the boys would be a rebel Wrap- 
ping a heavy shawl about her she stole across the 
hall, meaning only to send a message to the school- 
room by the first servant she met, asking that Lem 
might come to her. 

She heard the sounds of their rough mirth out 
there on the lawn. Through the side-glasses of the 
front door she could see them snow-balling each 
other vigorously. They would never come in 
answer to her tapping on the glass. She could not 
go back to that room by herself. She must find 
somebody. Her mother’s room was vacant. She 
must have dressed and gone somewhere hurriedly, 
for there, thrown across the foot of the bed, was the 
blue merino morning-wrapper, and pendant from 
its belt the velvet reticule. Without a moment’s 
thought as to consequences Hetty possessed herself 
of the bag, and assuring herself that the key was in 
it, walked rapidly toward the steps that led up to 
the attic. 

Her route led by the door of the long room, 
which was called the chapel, for, on occasion of min- 
isterial visitations, service had been held therein and 
all the neighbors bidden. The door was open now, 
and some one was playing on the little cabinet-organ 


A SriiAm^ PILGRIMAGE. 


m 


that stood at one end. It must be the new tutor. 
Hetty peeped cautiously in at the door. He was 
more of an expert with those ivory keys than he 
had been with the skates. But what a solemn 
taste ! Chopin’s Funeral March, however well per- 
formed, does not tend to exhilarate one’s spirits. 
She shivered at the mournful strains, and turning 
away almost ran toward the door at the foot of the 
attic steps, which she unlocked with trembling 
haste. She must explore that upper room once 
more. There was no one to hurry her now. 

Slowly around and around the room she walked, 
passing her soft hands ruthlessly along the rough 
plastering. The walls were intact. She reached 
the brass-mounted arinoire and stood motionless be- 
fore it. Full of the tenderest reverence for all that 
was good and true and beautiful, she yet had a mini- 
mum of youth’s sentimental deference for defunct 
romance. Who knew but that behind those solemn 
mahogany doors might not lay the clew to the mys- 
tery of that key — one mystery she might rid her- 
self of. 

She ruthlessly emptied the reticule of its contents. 
The key to that armoire^ if there, ought to be rusty 
with disuse. On the contrary*, the brightest one 
there fitted into the lock and turned with the ease of 
constant contact. She opened the doors with that 
noiseless stealth that comes from a sense of wrong- 
doing. She did not attempt to vindicate her 


m 


A STHAmE PimniMA(3E. 


conduct to herself. She acted like one under a spell. 
She was impelled to do what she was doing — com- 
pelled, she almost said. She was quite sure her 
Uncle Kichard wanted her to do it. How was she 
sure? She did not know. She simply was. She 
was driven forward by a power she could not com- 
prehend. 

Her mother had not overstated Mr. Dabney’s 
munificence to his coming bride. On the shelves 
lay shimmering satins and softest velvets. Long 
cloaks hung from the hooks. Square, flat handker- 
chief-boxes exlialed a musty fragrance as she 
touched their painted lids with shy fingers. Feather- 
tipped fans and yellow crape shawls lay in close 
proximity — a useless accumulation of feminine frip- 
pery toward none of which Hetty cast a second 
thought. Immediately in front of her, on a shelf 
she could easily reach, stood a small, black ebony 
box — silver-mounted — whose key-hole seemed to 
promise an end to her long search. If she only had 
not left the little key in her room. If only, again, 
she might seize this box and rush back to her room 
with it. That she might not do — the risk was too 
great. She might meet her mother at the foot of 
the stairs, coming too late to prevent the sacrilege 
she was committing. She felt hastily in the outside 
pocket of her wrapper. She had been sewing, and 
perhaps her Avax Avould do her good service. It Avas 
there. W^ith a quick, firm pressure she brought its 


A STI^A^’GB PILGI^IJfAGj^. 


12S 


yielding surface to bear on the silver-mounted key- 
hole. She held it there a breathless second. The 
unpress, when compared with the key^ would tell her 
whether she was right or wrong. And if she was 
right she would know at last wAy that key was of 
such vital importance to her Uncle Eichard ! 

Her Uncle Eichard !” 

It had only been in thought that she dwelt upon 
the name, standing there in presence of the tokens 
of his tenderness for the woman he had loved; 
but 

There came to her, softly, clearly, more nearly 
than ever before, a sigh ! 

A weary sigh, long-drawn, despondent, there from 
the very depths of the big. armoire^ whose sacred 
privacy she had so insolently invaded. She recoiled 
with a scream of terror, mechanically turned the 
key in the door, and fled back down the attic-stairs 
precipitately. 

The wailing strains of the Funeral March still 
floated on the quiet air ; the boys’ laughter still rang 
out healthily and vigorously from the lawn. She 
flung the reticule back upon the wrapper. In an- 
other moment she was cowering over her own fire 
again, white and trembling. 

Hot until that moment did she discover that the 
waxen impress of the key-hole stiU adhered to her 
fingers. 

Going to the place where she always kept the 


124 


A STBAmE PILGRIMAGE. 


little key secreted, she fitted it into the impression. 
They agreed in every particular. There was no 
room to doubt that the key in her possession fitted 
the ebony silver-mounted box in the armoire up- 
stairs. They belonged to each other. 


.1 STRANGE PILGRIMAGE, 


1:25 


CHAPTEE X. 


A MYSTERY A2vD A ROSE. 


no "WILL be sorry to hear that I have at 



» » last secured suitable quarters in town, where 
I can actually hold sway, undisputed sway, over a 
bed-room and an office of my own Doctor Mur- 
ray asked at the supper-table one evening, when he 
had been domesticated with the Glens several 
months. 

“ I will, for one,” said Mr. Glen, pausing in the 
operation of carving the chickens before him to 
add, “ Y on are not really in earnest 

“ Of course he is not !” said Mrs. Glen, looking at 
Archie reproachfully over the silver coffee-pot. “ I 
never could have imagined how handy a doctor 
about the house would be. Paul might have died 
in that spell of croup if you had not been immedi- 
ately on hand. You must not think of stuffy rooms 
in town.” 

Somehow Bemish always managed to attend to 
his practice from the plantation,” Mr. Glen said, and 
we are just about as handy to Hawkspoint as he is, 
I wish you would reconsider, Murray,” 


126 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


“ I don’t ’ant you t’ go. I tant fly my kite when 
you gone.” 

Thus Paul, the one exponent of juvenility in the 
Glen family, contributed his views. 

They were all sincere. They all liked him. They 
all regarded him as a desirable addition to the 
family circle. They all wanted to keep him there. 
Jn’o one was afraid to express the desire. Only 
Theresa remained silent. She, too, was at the tea- 
table ; but she did not even add a polite protest to 
the friendly chorus of regret. She sat playing with 
her tea-spoon while the argument for and against 
Doctor Murray’s moving into Hawkspoint was con- 
ducted in a spirited fashion by the rest of the 
family. Only once her soft, tender eyes were lifted 
to rest on his face for a fleeting second. It was 
when his eyes were turned from her, and he was 
listening respectfully to her sister-in-law. She was 
saying to herself, almost enviously : 

“How nicely he and Fanny get on together. 
How much admiring stress he continually lays upon 
women being free and frank and true, as if we all 
had the freedom to select for ourselves what man- 
ner of lives we ma}^ lead.” 

She sighed. The softest possible exhalation it 
was ; not enough to stir the cascade of rich lace 
that fell in a graceful jabot adown the front of her 
silken waist, but Archie caught it amid the clatter 
of the tea-table and the contention of friendly voices ; 


A STliAJSrail PlLGniMA&K 


m 

caught it and preserved the memory of it as ono 
preserves the fleeting perfume of some rare flower. 
She was looking unusually pretty that night, not- 
withstanding the extreme pallor which rarely ever 
forsook the smooth oval of her cheeks. The dark 
maroon silk dinner-dress she wore gave her the 
touch of warm color she sC much needed. 

Doctor Murray had come to like his host’s sister 
very much dmung his sojourn at Glencove. He 
found her refined, high-toned, gentle to an excess, 
almost, and at rare intervals disposed to exert her- 
self for his entertainment with amiable zeal. 

“If it were not for that hunted, furtive look in 
her beautiful eyes, if it were not for the conviction 
that she is hiding something, it would he easy, in- 
calculably easy,” xirchie had already told himself 
any number of times, “ to fall in love with Theresa 
Glen. But she is not without guile.” 

It was this consciousness, and the fear that con- 
stant contact with so much sweetness of manner 
and physical loveliness might, in the long run, under- 
mine his cooler judgment, that enabled him to per- 
- ■t in his determination to remove into Hawks- 
.’;:nt at the beginning of another month. Fleeing 
’’rom temptation, he called it. 

“Why do you suppose Doctor Murray is so per- 
sistent about moving into town ?” Mrs. Glen asked 
her husband that night as she stood plaiting her 
long hair before the mirror in their bed-room. “ He 


1^8 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


is twice as comfortable here as he can possibly be at 
Mrs. Burton’s ; and, then, Thersie has been different 
since he came — entirely different. Don’t you think 
so?” 

“Perhaps Thersie is at the bottom of his stubborn- 
ness.” 

“ Mrs. Glen stopped to look at her husband with 
her white fingers interlaced in the black meshes of 
her hair. “ What ! Pshaw, what creatures you men 
are. You think it utterly impossible for a woman 
to come in contact with one of your sex who is not 
actually outside the pale of the endurable, without 
falling in love. You need feel no alarm on that 
score because — because,” she stopped to give her 
undivided attention to a stubborn knot in the silky 
strands of her hair. 

“ Because — well ! Bear in mind, I was not allud- ' 
ing to danger to Thersie, but to Murray. Perhaps 
he don’t care to tumble in love when he has nothing 
a year to marry on. Discretion, valor, that sort of 
thing, you know.” 

“ Men are not in much danger from preoccupied 
women,” said Mrs. Glen in an experienced manner. 

“ Thersie is already in love with one man. She has 
not a turtle-egg sort of heart, ready to take the 
impress of every finger.” 

“ You mean Hugh Maury ?” 

Mrs. Glen rid herself of the snarl in her hair with 
a merciless jerk, flung the mass back over her head, 


A SmAiYGB PILGRIMAGE. 


129 


and folding her hands over the ridding-comb, looked 
at her husband very seriously : 

“ Charlie, I’m not prepared to say. But I am pro- 
pared to say that Thersie has been a different 
ure since that affair at the fish-fry. Whether it w^as 
George Bemish or Hugh Maury, I do not know. I 
do not believe that it was simply the death of that 
horrid little creature who spoke to her so insultingly 
that day. She would have gotten over that alone. 
She does not get over this at all, though. Did you 
notice how pale she looked at the tea-table 

“ I did. But then Thersie never was very high- 
colored, you know.” 

I know that as well as you do. Do you know 
what day of the month this is 

’Bon honor, I hadn’t given it a thought.” 

‘‘Well, I have. It is always, as the time of the 
month returns in which that tragedy was enacted, 
when Theresa is at her worst. She was ghostly to- 
nmht. If it had not been for that red dress she had 
on, you would have been compelled to notice it. 
But men never notice anything less conspicuous than 
the nose on one’s face.” 

Mr. Glen whistled prolongedly and softly — a 
sure sign of perplexity with him. Mrs. Glen com- 
pleted her arrangements for retiring before speaking 
again : 

“ I wish it were possible to keep him here. He 
does us all good. So lively and cheerful in spite of 
the great change in his circumstances — — ” 


130 


A 8TRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


‘‘Murray’s every inch a man,” said Mr. Glen 
enthusiastically, snapping his wife’s sentence in two ; 
“ and while Thersie is in no manner of danger from 
him, he does her good. Y oung people need young 
people. Y oung girls need young men. They sup- 
plement each other. She likes to play for him. She 
likes to heat him at croquet. She likes to listen 
while he is telling you of the pranks the medical 
students were always playing. 

“Well,” said Mr. Glen reflectively, standing his 
empty shoes side by side, “ we’ll make another 
onslaught to-morro\v and see if we can’t keep him. 
I’m not averse to his company myself.” 

All unconscious of this flattering discussion, the 
subject of it was at the same time pondering his 
proposed removal no less earnestly. It was Archie’s 
self-indulgent jiractice to envelop all his reveries in 
tobacco-smoke. He was quite sure he was far 
enough away from the rest of the household to 
render a consolatory pipe safe. It would help him 
to a decision. 

Notwithstanding the fact that the calendar 
pointed to the last day of February, there was what 
Mr. Glen called a “ mild snap ” on, and he raised one 
of the side-windows in his room to permit the fumes 
of tobacco to escape. 

His brain worked actively as lie sat there in the 
big chair he had drawn close to the open window 
a.nd tilted back luxuriously against the projection 


A BTRAmE PiLGRlMAGE. I3I 

made by the inside chimney. He was a trifle nerv- 
ous about this proposed move into town. It might 
be to his disadvantage ; he could not tell. He won- 
dered if he ever would feel settled again. The com- 
ing move naturally carried him back to the last one. 
He often thought of the old, peaceful life he and 
his Uncle Kichard had led together. Led it,” he 
bitterly reflected, “ as if it had been for all time and 
eternity, too, Avith no dream of change or disaster.” 
He tried to fancy the old home under the new or- 
der. That brought his Aunt Agnes on the scene, 
and those awful boys, and Hetty ! . Pretty, sweet 
little Hetty 1 He wondered hoAv she got on ? Mce 
little thing.” He did not tarry long in the past. 
The present was exigent — yet even its exigencies 
were held in abeyance at that moment of subdued 
quiet. 

The broad beams of a full moon bathed the peace- 
ful landscape before him in a flood of serene light. 
There Avas nothing very novel or fascinating in the 
outlook ; but he had been so battered and buffeted 
about of late that his brightening prospects had a 
soothing tendency, and he pronounced it all good. 
Beyond the trim hedging of Osage orange which 
inclosed the yard premises lay the broad acres from 
Avhich all the cotton and corn had been garnered. 
In their midst nestled the whiteAvashed village of 
quarter-cabins, gleaming Avhitely in the moonlight 
Avhere not hidden by the locust and china-trees that 


182 


A STJ^AJV&U PILGrdMAGK 


crowded close up about them. Over and above 
them all — cabins, barns and cribs — the stately gin- 
house loomed in magnificent proportions. Immedi- 
ately in front of him was the thickly shrubbed yard, 
its conical cedars making a shadowy showing in that 
obscure light. The note of an owl fioated in to him 
from among their branches. He hated owls with a 
womanish, unreasoning hatred. This one completely 
spoiled his reverie. He might as well go to bed. 
He leaned out of the window to draw the outside 
shutters together, but started back in startled sur- 
prise and stood motionless, a few paces removed 
from the window. 

There, coming slowly around the corner of the 
house, by way of the veranda upon which his window 
opened, was Theresa Glen. For a second she paused 
irresolutely in front of his Avindow, Avhere she stood 
perfectly motionless, her folded hands dropped nerv- 
ously in front of her. Her side-face Avas turned to- 
ward him. Hoav beautiful its clear-cut, cameo out- 
hnes Avere ! She A\"as not dressed as she had been at 
dinner. A long, trailing Avhite AA^rapper enveloped 
her noAv, and about her . head a fieecy nubia Avas 
wrapped. 

Perhaps,” Archie said to himseK, she has been 
enjoying the moonlight from her oAvn corner of the 
veranda and fancies every one else has retired, and 
that confounded open shutter had startled her.” 

Even in that moment, he marveled at his OAvn 
eager plea for her. 


A STMAJSrGE PILGRIMAGE. 133 

But lie was mistaken. There was no hurrying 
past his window. ]^o furtive sidewise glances to 
discover if she were noticed. With her head held 
slightly forward, in an attitude of acute attention, 
quite as if she followed involuntarily where she was 
bidden, she passed on after that brief pause, with 
her slim fingers interlocked and one end of the white 
nubia traihng along the floor unnoticed. 

My God, she is a somnambulist 1” 

Archibald Murray said it aloud. Said it with a 
ring of intense anxiety in his voice. Should he fol- 
low her ? That was the pressing question of the 
moment. There was no mistaking that tense atti- 
tude — that direct, unfaltering, swift onward move- 
ment. He leaned out once more. Straight for- 
ward, with never a glance to right or left, she was 
moving. What was his own course ? That was the 
perplexing question. Presently, down there below, 
in the shrub-crowded garden, he saw the gleam of 
her long, white wrapper again. The nubia had 
fallen off entirely, caught perhaps on the thorns of 
some rose-bush. She was at the gate ! 

Ilis decision was made as the click of the iron 
latch, lifted and dropped by her unfaltering hand, 
told him that she was once more abroad by herself, 
in the lonelj^ fields, under a midnight sky. 

The iron latch of the front gate v/as lifted and 
dropped once more — this time by Archibald Mur- 
ray’s cautious hand. He would follow her, discreetly 


134 


A STJ^AMA^ pilquimagM. 


and at a distance, but near enough to succor her 
should she need succor. 

lie wished now he had made up his mind more 
promptly. She moved so swiftly that it was only 
by the white gleam of her draperies that he could 
follow her motions. Was she going to the tool- 
house again? He was familiar with the route 
now — could follow her lead in that direction the 
darkest night ; and when once there, would he be 
able to stand passively on the outside while she was 
led within by the man whom he had never yet iden- 
tified — had never, indeed, caught but that one 
glimpse of ? He ground his teeth passionately to- 
gether. He swore to himself that he was only ac- 
tuated by humanity and professional curiosity ; but 
his blood coursed hotly in his veins at the thought 
of having once again to witness the strange scene 
that had greeted him on the first night of his 
arrival. 

Perhaps it was no tryst this time. He stumbled, 
recovered himself, and peered eagerly forward amid 
the gloomy shadows of the trees. He had lost the 
object of his surveillance. He stood still for a 
second, looking around in perplexity. Could she 
have turned back ? There was no sound of crackfing 
twigs under her hurrying feet to guide him, no 
glimmer of her white draperies to lure him on. She 
had taken her way along the lake-bank, outside the 
Osage-hedging. Perhaps she had crept through some 


A STBAJVGIJ PILGRIMAGE. 


135 


break in it. A false step to the left — another halt. 
The sound of oars cautiously plied smote upon his 
ear. He veered to the right and almost ran toward 
the water’s edge. 

A skiff was being rapidly rowed away from the 
Glencove shore. It was already several yards from 
the bank. He could not see the oarsman, for the 
boat’s track lay among black shadows, but sitting 
mute and erect in the stern was an object draped aU 
in white. That, then, accounted for his losing sight 
of Theresa Glen so suddenly ! 

He reached out his hand and called her name. 
Only a dip of oars ! 

He stood upon the bank impotent, foiled, con- 
sumed by a surge of passion which fairly surprised 
hunself. What was this girl to him? he asked him- 
self, gnashing his teeth in fury. Why should he 
care what evil power held her in bondage? He 
turned and walked back toward his room blind with 
impotent rage. He could not sleep. He could not 
even remain in one spot two seconds of time to- 
gether. He was waiting for something. Waiting 
to know that this girl, who was “ nothing to him,” 
was once more safely housed. 

The moon had long since gone down. Black 
darkness enveloped the house and yard. It was 
more than useless for him to peer out so often and 
so eagerly. He was waiting for her. She came 
after a long while. A swift scurrying of feet, th§ 


136 


A STIiAiYG^ PILGRIMAGE. 


rustle of trailing draperies, a faint scent of roses, 
silence. He leaned out once more to draw the out- 
side shutters together. A lamp was suddenly 
lighted in a room at the end of fke veranda. A ray 
of light shot through the shutters and showed him 
something lying on the gallery floor in front of his 
own window. He leaned out and picked up a large 
red rose^ Theresa had worn one like it at dinner 
that day. He would keep it ! 


A ST&ANCH! PILGSIUAaiS. 


137 


CHAPTEE XI. 


DOCTOR BEMISII CARRIES HIS POINT. 

YEE. THE smooth, dark waters, the old man 



rowed. Eowed with the long, steady, de- 
liberate stroke of the skilled oarsman who has 
learned that haste makes waste. Every dip of the 
oars sent the narrow-pointed skiff skimming across 
the still lake with a jar less motion that might have 
lulled a fretful child to slumber. 

Motionless, with her hands folded across her 
knees and her head bent dreamily forward, sat 
Theresa Glen spell-bound, her mind led captive by 
the stronger mind and the fierce purpose that actu- 
ated the old man opposite her. 

He pitied her. Pitied her for the helplessness 
that made her his tool for the time being. Pitied 
her that circumstances had placed her in possession 
of the awful secret he was bending every energy of 
his soul and faculty of his brain to wrest from her. 
He pitied himself for the role he had to play toward 
a girl who had been almost as his own daughter 
before these latter days of darkness had come upon 
the name of Bemish. But more than all, above 
all, he pitied the son of his loins, who was hiding 


138 A pimRiMAej^l 

like a beast in bis lair, suffering the un worded 
penance of a life-sentence for a crime lie had never 
committed. 

Whenever he felt his purpose failing, the old man 
had but to think of George wasting away in his 
island refuge, to feel his purpose become as steel 
links that grappled him and held him fast to the 
one only object of his existence. 

He landed the skiff immediately in. front of his 
own gate, and almost lifting his companion across the 
gunwale, he carefully wrapped about her the long 
black-hooded cloak he had put in the skiff for her pro- 
tection when starting, and drawing her hand tenderly 
within his arm, he walked swiftly up through 
the avenue of myrtles wdiich flanked the paved way 
from the gate to the house. The house itself stood 
dark and tenantless before him. Ho glimmer of 
light came from Avindow or door. There Avas no liv- 
ing thing Avithin it. But that Avas not his goal. 
Past the house ; out through- the tangled gardens 
that had once been his pride and boast, into the 
Avooded meadoAVS beyond, Aviiere the tall trees bent 
over the dark Avaters of a bayou ; on, unsAvervingly, 
along the damp, de\yy meadoAvs, to a spot Avhich he 
could never pass in the broadest sunshine of the 
brightest day Avithout a shudder passing t^irough his 
strong frame ! The spot Avhere the Frenchman had 
been found dead ! The spot Avhere George Bemish 
had been seen to stoop and pick up a gory knife and 


A PimBIMAGE. 


130 


fling it far out into the waters of the bayou that 
had held its secret ever since ! 

A shudder passed through Theresa Glen’s shght 
form. He felt it. It communicated itself to him 
through the arm she was leaning on. He came to a 
sudden halt (jn the spot he knew so well. How 
many times he had trodden down the grasses that 
sprung to hide its hideousness, in the vain search for 
a clew which nature heartlessly denied him ! He 
breathed hard and fast! What if his will-power 
should play him false? grow weak — too weak to 
enable him to hold her mind in subjection until she 
had yielded up all her knowledge of that dreadful 
day into his keeping ? It was the supreme moment 1 
She had escaped him before, just at the moment 
when success seemed ready to croAvn his efforts. 
He silently invoked aid from the God who is a lover 
of justice. 

Had he not a right to wipe out the stain with 
which ignorance and injustice had blotted his boy’s 
fair fame and his own good name ? There must be 
no dallying with opportunity. Ho failure now 
through pity for the innocent girl who stood by his 
side, i^owerless to escape the bondage his will held 
hers in. 

It was both too late and too soon to think of her 
at all. He needed an implement, a weapon, if you 
will, with which to batter down the walls that were 
shutting out life and freedom from the son who was 


140 


A STJlAJ^ai^ PILGRIMAGE. 


more than life to him. He had found it in this pure, 
tender girl, and he would use it, must use it, as 
mercilessly as if it were made of ruder stuff and 
colder metal, with no fine edge to be destroyed 
irreparably. 

Just here,” he said, tightening his hold of the 
cold little hand that lay upon his arm, the mur- 
dered man was found that day, after the fish-fry. 
It was groAving toward afternoon. You and Hugh 
Maury had started home in his buggy. He had to 
drive through my fields because the bridge was 
doAvn over Slade’s bayou. George Bemish re- 
mained on the fishing-ground to see the rest of his 
guests off. The' Frenchman had left the ground 
long before. He had not been seen among the 
ladies since he had spoken impertinent words to you 
and Hugh Maury had threatened to thrash him.” 

He spoke slowly and distinctly. He Avas forcing 
her backAvard, cruelly and pitilessly. By some out- 
cry, some spoken Avord, she should commit herself to 
a confession from Avhich she could not draw back, 
even Avhen her mind had once more resumed action 
independent of him. He had not consumed his 
days and Avasted the hours that belonged to sleep 
pondering this one subject Avithout coming to some 
settled convictions. This Avas one of them. 

If he could force Theresa Glen to live OA^er again 
that moment of horror, he might free his boy. 

She was shivering, but mute. The night Avind 


A Sl'BANGJS PILGRIMAGE. 


141 


sighed in the tops of the tall trees. The dark 
waters of the bayou murmured softly as they rip- 
pled against the gnarled roots of the water-oaks on 
its banks. A far-away owl hooted dismally. The 
stars looked placidly down from serene heights. 
The old man paused a second and then resumed, 
where he had left off, in a slow, steady monotone : 

“ The Frenchman’s heart was full of bitterness at 
the insult that had been put upon him before women. 
He was walking home by this same road when 
Hugh Maury, with you by his side, came by laugh- 
ing and happy. The Frenchman saw you and ” 

Fie stopped, catching his breath nervously. The 
next Avord, if it Avere the Avrong Avord, might break 
the speU and leave him poAverless. Her voice took 
up the ghastly story : 

“ He laughed — such an insolent laugh ! It was 
as if he Avere hurhng insults after me !” 

FIoav strange and sAveet and unreal her dreamy 
tones sounded out there under the distant stars, with 
no human ear to catch them but the Avithered one 
of an old man, Avho drank them in thirstily. He 
took up the narrative cautiously : 

He laughed — such an insolent laugh ! It was as 
if he were hurling insults after you. It stung Hugh 
Maury to quick Avrath ” 

‘‘Yes !” 

It Avas scarcely more than a gasp. 

“Fie drove past a feAV rods, stopped ” 


142 


A STHAJ^^GB PILGRIMAGE. 


Had not he discovered for himself the trampled 
spot where the impatient horse had pawed the 
ground ? But it had gone for naught in George’s 
defense. 

‘"Stopped?” she echoed him in a frightened 
whisper. 

The old man did not notice her interruption. 

“ Hugh jumped out and ran back. He told you a 
lie ! He told you he was only going to speak to the 
Frenchman — no more !” 

“ FTo more ! no more !” 

Was it the night- wind’s moan or a woman’s depo- 
sition ? 

“ That was all he did mean at first. But his hot 
blood was up. The Frenchman was tipsy and inso- 
lent. You were out of sight. There were words, 
angry words, then silence! Ho noisy, ruffianly 
pistol-shots told what had happened. When Hugh 
Maury took the reins again, perhaps ” 

“There was blood upon his wristband! There 
was blood upon Hugh’s wristband ! Oh ! Hugh ! 
Hugh ! Hugh ! Why did you kill him ?” 

A woman’s shriek mingled with the sighing of 
the night-wind ! The spell was broken ! Shudder- 
ing, frightened, aroused, she stretched out her hands, 
swaying like a storm-tossed flower. The old man 
caught her in his arms and hurried toward the 
house with her. She lay across his bosom a dead- 
weight. He stumbled heavily up the steps with his 


A STHAJSTGB PILGRIMAGE. 143 

burden. It was a slight one, but he was old, 
and the physical strain he had been under ever since 
he had stolen across the lake for his captive had 
been great — he was aweary of limb and of soul. 

He groped his way through the dark halls and 
laid Theresa tenderly down upon a sofa in his study. 
Then he lighted a lamp, shaded it carefully, inspected 
all the windows, satisfied himself that no ray of 
fight coulck possibly escape through the drawn cur- 
tains, and applied himself to the task of restoration. 

Poor child ! poor child !” he crooned over her, 
as he moistened her white lips with brandy and 
chafed her chill temples and feet with his vein- 
seamed hands as tenderly as a mother could have 
done it. 

She opened her eyes presently and looked lan- 
guidly about the room without moving. 

“ I have had one of those horrible dreams again ! 
Eosine ! Eosine ! wake up ; I want you !” 

But there was no response from Eosine. She 
raised herself upon her elbow and gazed about her 
in bewilderment. She recognized the room at once 
as the office in Doctor Bemish’s house. Its musty 
books, glass cases of vials, electric batteries and 
other appliances had always been objects of more 
terror than interest to her. She saw it now, for the 
first time, in the dim fight of a shaded lamp — it did 
not make it more attractive. 

She rose and came toward the old man, who was 


144 


A PILOHiMAGR 


standing by the mantel-piece with his back turned 
toward her. Had it just come to him that he had 
taken an unfair advantage of her ? In the moment 
of achievement had remorse overtaken him ? He 
did not stir when he heard her call the maid, who 
always slept within her reach. He did not stir un- 
til she laid her hand upon his arm and asked, won- 
deringly : 

‘‘ What am I doing here, doctor ? How came I 
here ? Why am I not at home 

“You came because I wanted you, my child,” he 
answered with infinite gentleness, covering the 
hand she had laid upon his arm with fatherly 
caresses. “You came because I needed you.” 

“ But how did I get here she persisted, looking 
around the dimly-lighted room, where ghostly 
shadows flitted when the wind turned the fire-flames 
hither and thither. 

“ I brought you here !” 

“ What for ?” 

“ To make you teU me the truth !” 

“ The truth ? The truth about what 

A look of horror flashed into her eyes as his mean- 
ing broke upon her. 

“What!” she exclaimed, recoiling from him in 
horror. “ You, the man whom I have looked up to as 
a father — you have brought all your science, all 
your learning, all your will-power to bear upon a 
weak girl’s weak brain, tu force from her the secret 


A BTMAMjij PILGMMagM, 


145 


tiiat has made life one long, hideous curse to her ! 
You have stolen the truth ; now what use will you 
make of it ? Tell me that, brave scientist !” 

Think of George !” the old man pleaded, quail- 
ing before the indignant fire of her eyes. 

I did think of him when I stole like a thief in 
the night and opened his prison-doors with my own 
hand. I could not let him suffer for what he had 
not done. He is free. The world is large. Doubt- 
less long before this he has formed ties and gained 
love that makes life bright. I made him free. He 
has not suffered.” 

The old man groaned. Her words conjured up 
the forlorn figure of his son hiding from the face of 
his fellow-men, burrowing in the earth for refuge. 
He turned upon her savagely : 

“You made him free? Perhaps you opened his 
prison-doors and told him to go forth, spotted and 
stained, but free from danger of the halter ! Your 
fine sense of justice carried you but a short way on 
the road you should have gone. I tell you, girl, you 
will never know what it has cost me to wrest your 
secret from you ! But it is mine — mine at last ! and 
I Avill proclaim it from the house-tops !” 

He laughed triumphantly. She shuddered and 
drew aAvay from him in terror. 

“You make me afraid of you. I do not recog- 
nize you. You were so kind and gentle always.” 

“Were !” he laughed mockingly; “but now I am 


146 J- STBAmJS PILOIlL%AOE. 

going to be just! Just— only just, nothing more! 
Come!” He brought forward the' cloak she had 
worn. “ I must get you home before I rest ; and I 
am tired, tired — sick and tired. If it were not for 
the work I have to do, how gladly I could lie down 
and die.” 

“Workr 

‘^Yes, work! I have to clean the Bemi&h 
escutcheon before I die, and my sands are running 
low. I have to tell the w^orld that a soft, fair 
woman has held justice and truth balanced in the 
scales against a lover’s welfare, and truth kicked the 
beam. And you, of all won? en — soft, tender, pitiful — 
you, whom I have loved as my own daughter — you, 
to shield a murderer all these years !” 

“Hush ! You shall not pour out your hot, bitter 
accusations against me — not another one! If the 
powers of darkness, which 3^our learning has taught 
you how to evoke, have given you a triumph over me, 
it is a very poor one. If I were asked before the 
tribunal of high Heaven if I believed Hugh Maury 
to be a murderer I should say — yes ! If I were asked 
before a tribunal of men if I Icnew Hugh Maury to 
be a murderer I should say — no ! I saw no blow 
struck. I heard no outcry. That horrible ride 
home was made in absolute silence. From the mo- 
ment I sprang from that buggy at my brother’s 
gate up to the present one I have known no more 
about Hugh Maury than you do !” she gasped, and 


A STBAJ^GE PILGRIMAGE. 147' 

went on, breathlessly: “Whether he be dead or 
alive is more than I can say. I was his promised 
wife. He knew that I was his accuser when I 
dreAY our betrothal-ring from my finger and flung it 
from me as we rode home side by side with that 
ghastly secret betAveen us. 

“ I hate my life ! If it Avere not for the sin of it, 
I cQuld easily fling it aAA’ay as a thing of no Avortli. 
There Avas one person I have sometimes thought 
it would comfort me to go to — one Avhom I 
thought Avas a felloAA' -sufferer Avith me. That one 
person has duped me, used me, handled me as a mere 
puppet, and Avould doubtless think he Avas simply 
doing his duty as a father if he had made me sAvear 
to lies Avhile he held my Avill in bondage.” 

“Ho! God knoAA-s I have had my fiU of lies! 
The truth alone is AA^hat I have punished myself 
and tortured you to obtain ! My child, you Avrong 
me !” 

“You may well say tortured. My brain is on 
fire!” 

He looked at her in alarm. Her eyes gloAved like 
coals and a red fever-spot shone on either cheek. 
He hurried her into the skiff and once more took up 
the oars. It Avas Avith tired arms that he made the 
first stroke. He did not point the proAV straight 
across the lake. He Avould land his patient-passenger 
immechately in front of her brother’s gate. 

There Avas no danger of discovery. The night 


148 


A STBANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


had worn well on toward morning. In that rural 
neighborhood there was nothing to keep the people 
abroad. The world was asleep. He rowed silently 
and vigorously. Ho words passed between him and 
the girl in the stern, who was no longer erect, but 
sat shivering and sobbing beneath the cloak he had 
wrapped about her. 

“ Theresa, my child,” he said, as she sprang up to 
leave the boat as soon as practicable, ^ may not 
see you again ; you know I am not the doctor, now. 
I want you to say you forgive George’s father for 
what he has done.” 

She passed him without response. He could hear 
her teeth chattering violently as she stepped beyoncj 
him in the skiff. 


A PILGRIMAGE. 


149 


CHAPTEK XII, 


A MYSTIFYING DISCOVERY, 


“ PULL over the water ” before breakfast had 



come to be a regular practice of Archibald 
Murray’s since he had been among the lake-dwell- 
ers. He was up and out earlier than usual on the 
morning that followed his futile espionage of Theresa 
Glen. He had spent a sleepless, restless night try- 
ing to decide a question which positively refused to 
be decided : 

Should he give such information as chance had 
put into his hands, concerning Miss Glen’s strange 
trysts with a man unlmown to him, into Leonard 
Glen’s keeping ? If yes,” how was his host likely 
to take it ? If no,” where would it aU end for the 
gud, who was evidently under some malign influence ? 
Alas, for the woman he loved ! 

The lily-pads crowded insolently close to the 
banks in that usurping fashion Xature displays where 
once she gains a foot-hold. Those Southern lily- 
pads were huge ; their stems penetrated the water 
to a depth of six and nine feet, and their green disks 
spread out on its surface in a compact mass. Archi- 
bald forced the boat through them with fierce impa- 


150 


A STJtAmE PILOniMAGE. 


tience that morning ; he wanted to get clear of their 
entangling grasp ; he wanted to get from under the 
shadow of the thickly-shrubbed yard, out into the 
middle of the lake, where there was nothing but the 
clear, June skies above and the clear, pure Avater 
beneath. The water Avas transparent ; there Avere no 
dark places there, no mystery, nothing baffling. He 
hated to be baffled. 

It AA^as early — so early, that the spot in the east 
Avhere the sun Avould presently lift his head to glorify 
the Avorld Avas enveloped in a luminous golden haze. 
As he stood up in the boat to divest himself of his 
coat before settling doAvn to the oars, the tops of 
the trees put there on Alligator Island began to 
shimmer in the light of the rising sun. The conical 
Island Avas aglow with these fiery tips. 

Why not roAv to the Island ? He had often de- 
clared his intention of exploring that small king- 
dom in spite of its OAvner’s multiple Avarnings to 
trespassers. He could scarcely do that much this 
morning, but at least he might roAv around it and 
back to the glen-landing before breakfast — a meal 
Avhich Avas aristocratically late, always, under that 
luxurious roof. 

He roAved Avell. The exercise Avas delightful to 
him at all times ; but this morning, as his broad 
chest expanded Avith every stroke of the oars, and 
the fairy rings curled away in a sparkling procession 
from the deftly-feathered blades, he Avas conscious 


A PlLGttlMA&E. 


m 


of a sense of physical strength and freedom that was 
exhilarating in the extreme. He could row on thus 
forever and forever, he said to himself, if she were 
hut sitting there opposite him, as she so often sat at 
even-tide, looking sweet and calm and majestic — 
not caring for idle chatter or for grave converse — con- 
tent, as he was himself, to sit silent and listen to the 
soft rustle of the water as it curled away from the 
sharp prow of the boat. It was at such moments 
that he felt almost sure she and he were drifting to- 
ward the haven that true-lovers ever steer for. 

He turned his head to note progress and make a 
fresh estimate of the distance that lay between him 
and Alligator Island. He was gaining on it rapidly. 
It lay there, bathed in a flood of golden sunlight, 
an unbroken mass of greenery. Between him and it 
he noticed a dark object dancing on the waves. 

“Some fellow has lost his skiff. I’ll take it in 
tow,” was his neighborly resolution. He pointed 
his own boat straight for the dancing object. It 
was bobbing and dipping merrily as the brisk morn- 
ing breeze touched its brightly-painted sides, danc- 
ing farther away from him on every wave. It 
really seemed trying to elude his pursuit ; but tlie 
strong-armed rower was soon alongside, and leaning- 
over he grasped its chain, w^hich was fastened by a 
ring in the bow. 

Archibald’s lips turiied white, and his vigorous 
frame trembled with passion as the little craft 


m 


A STRAmiE! PILGRIMAGE!. 


swung around submissively and lay broadside to liis 
owm boat. 

There was a woman’s cloak spread protectingly 
over the seat in the stern ! There was a dark-red 
rose lying stemless, but gemmed with dew, on the 
middle seat! There was a bit of damp cambric 
lying on one of the thwarts! He seized it and 
spread it open with a trembhng hand. There was 
an embroidered “ G ” in one corner, and it exhaled 
the fragrance she was so fond of— heliotrope ! The 
stemless rose, sparkling there before him — had he 
not put its fellow carefully away in his pocket-book 
before going to bed the night before ? Oh, fool ! 
fond fool that he was ! A man’s heavy buckskin 
gauntlet was pressed into either oar-lock. 

Muffled oars !” he said, grinding his teeth in im- 
potent fury. “Curse him — curse the hour I ever 
saw her!” 

A shrill whistle attracted his attention. He 
raised his head and looked toward the Glencove side 
of the lake. The whistler was not there. He 
scanned the main-land on the opposite side. Hor 
there. It was repeated, then followed by a pro- 
longed “Hal-loo!” in a man’s hoarse voice. He 
turned his head toward Alligator Island. 

There, at the remote edge of the water, stood 
a man waving his hat and handkerchief energetic- 
ally. In the few moments ‘of his absorption in the 
discovery of these evidences of Theresa Glen’s occu- 


A PILGRIMAGE. 


153 


paiicy of the boat he had just captured, while his 
oars were lying idle in the locks, he had drifted 
sensibly nearer to the Island — near enough for words 
to come to him distinctly. 

‘‘ Kindly fetch that skiff this way, Avill you ?” were 
the words that came to his ears just then. 

He looked away from the man, and sat with his 
hands folded over the crossed oars. His soul was 
in a perfect tempest of conflicting emotions. Why 
should he do this man’s bidding? Would it be well 
for him to come in closer contact with the man whom 
he believed was exercising some evil power over 
Theresa Glen ? Would it be safe ? What right had 
he to resent this matter ? Why should he care ? 

I will pay you well !” came across the water, 
anxiously. I have no means of getting home.” 

The words came each time more distinctly to his 
ears. The wind had wafted him nearer still to Alli- 
gator Island. He turned his head once more in the 
direction of the speaker. He could see him per- 
fectly well, now. It was an old man — a man who 
stood in a stooping attitude, and whose hair, blown 
about by the breeze while he still kept his hat in his 
hand, was perfectly white. Archibald took in these 
details deliberately. Then, from an impulse inex- 
plicable to himself, he placed his oars in position 
and rowed direct for the speaker. He stood up and 
faced toward him as soon as practicable, regarding 
Jiim with a fierce sort of interest, 


.154 


A STIiAJV'GJ^ PILGRIMAGE. 


Yes, it Avas an old man. An old man of cour- 
teous mien, Avith a kindly, care-Avorn face and a 
voice of extreme gentleness. A gentleman, to all 
seeming. 

I am afraid, from your evident reluctance to 
come this Avay, that you ^yere in some haste to roAv 
in the opposite direction,’’ he said, clambering stiffly 
into his OAvn skiff at the earliest possible moment. 

I am exceedingly obliged to you. I came over to 
this brambly bit of my property to see if it could be 
turned into a place of refuge for the stock, in vieAV 
of the threatened overfioAv this spring, and I care- 
lessly left the chain of my skiff around a bush too 
Aveak to hold it. You are Awy good and I am A^ery 
fortunate. I thank you very much !” 

He had the oars in his hands by this time, and 
Avas evidently not only ready but anxious to take 
his immediate departure. He had accounted for 
his presence on the Island Avith such iierA^ous volu- 
bility that Archibald Avas compelled to take note of 
his uneasiness. 

Who are you?” he asked, bluntly. 

My name is Bemish.” 

Doctor Bemish ?” 

The same ; and, by the Avay, doubtless this is my 
successor.” He held out an unsteady hand across 
the gunAvale of the boat to the young doctor. I 
had hoped you Avould have honored me Avith a call. 
I am glad the folks have called you here; my 


A ^fiiAm£! PiLomMAOii. 15S 

day is done. I am a useless old hack. My son, I 
wish you a smooth career. I hear you are making 
friends fast. Make them and keep them. The 
neighborhood needs you. I am your well-wislier.” 

Archibald looked at him with a growing sense of 
confusion. He had rejected the proffered hand, 
which now lay rigidly clasped about the oar. He 
prided himself on his skill in physiognomy. There 
was a great deal to be learned from the care-lines 
and the furrows in the strong face before liim. 
There were lines of endurance and patience — there 
was pathos, and weariness, and anxiety, all clearly 
mapped out ; but he should not say that the man 
before him was likely to act the part of the foul 
fiend toward a woman. 

‘‘ After all,” he said to himself, am I not manu- 
facturing my own misery out of mere scraps and 
fancies?” 

The thought tended to lighten his spirits wonder- 
fully. Might not a plain talk with Theresa make it 
all clear ? He would have it that very morning. 

All this mental work had been going on while 
Doctor Bemish was formally welcoming him as his 
successor. 

Scarcely successor,” he said, unbending from his 
rigid attitude. Perhaps the neighborhood found 
it needed two physicians. I have called at your 
place twice, both times to find you out. I have 
never chanced to meet you in town. I am glad to 
know you, sir.” 


15(5 


A STBAJ^O^ PILGRIMAGE!. 


I never go to toAvn — never. Things have 
changed, you know. Pardon me if I say I am very 
tired and feel the need of my breakfast.” 

With these abrupt words he dipped his oars into 
the water and bowed stiffly. 

This is a bit of your property that I propose to 
explore some day, Doctor,” Archibald said, tenta- 
tively. I know you warn off trespassers, hut I sup- 
pose that is to protect your pecan-groves and timber, 
and would not include the profession.” 

The old man answered, with nervous irritability : 

“It is an impenetrable thicket, full of swamps 
and bogs. I wish it were sunk in the lake. I’ve just 
satisfied myself that I would not even dare turn my 
stock loose on it in high-water. The}^ would bog in 
its morasses. It wouldn’t pay you, unless you are 
prepared to lose all your clothes and some of your 
cuticle.” 

“You seem to have come off more easily.” 

“ I only skirted along the water’s edge this morn- 
ing. Moreover, I knew every foot of it before the 
undergrowth became so thick. Thank you for 
catching my boat. Hope I have not made you late 
for your breakfast. Good-morning, sir.” 

He made one or two irresolute strokes with his 
oars. He was evidently bent on seeing Archibald 
start toward Glencove before he took his own de- 
parture. 

“ For some reason,” that astute observer was say- 


A PiLQlllMAGB, 15*^ 

ing to himself, this maker of mysteries does not 
want his Island invaded. I shall invade it later in 
the day, and explore it thoroughly.” 

Do you take such long pulls as this often he 
asked, raising his own oars for a dip. 

^^Karely ever. I took it for an appetizer this 
morning.” 

Both boats were well under way by this time. 
The men touched their hats to each other. With 
every stroke their paths lay farther asunder. 

He is lying to me,” said Archibald, looking to- 
waAl the lessening boat which the old man was \dg- 
orously rowing toward his own side of the lake. “ He 
has not come from liis place this morning, unless he 
started before daybreak. He has spent the night on 
that Island.” 

‘‘ He suspects something,” said the old man, with 
a groan, looking after the lessening boat which the 
young man Avas vigorously roAving toAA^ard his OAvn 
side of the lake. One more pilgrimage my poor 
little Theresa must make; then I Avill release her from 
this bondage. Her Avritten signature, and George 
is free ! Poor child---poor, frail floAver 1 If I could 
but nurse her back to health and strength, or tell 
them to take her away after she has done me this 
last serAuce. But she hates me Avhen she is at her- 
self — loathes me ; and small blame to her.” 

There Avere anxious eyes and anxious hearts await 
ing Archibald’s return to the house that morning. 


158 


A PiLQUIMA^R 


Mr. Glen was standing on the plank-staging that 
ran out among the lily-pads, for convenience in get- 
ting in and out of the skilf, with his face full of 
gloom. 

“What an infernally long row you must have 
taken this morning,” he said, testily, bending over to 
expedite Archibald’s landing by himself pulling the 
boat close up to the platform. 

“ I did go a little farther than usual ; the morn- 
ing was tempting.” Then, with startled emphasis, as 
he caught the anxious expression on his host’s face : 
“[N’othing wrong, is there?” 

“ Fanny thinks there is.” 

“ Paul ?” 

“ IN’o — Thersie.” 

“ Good God !” 

He was on shore now, and struggled into his coat 
as he walked hastily toward the house by Mr. Glen’s 
side. 

“ What is it ?” 

“ That’s what we can’t make out. Fanny says 
she found her lying on the lounge in her room, i 
dressed in her wrapper ; the bed had not been slept ' 
in last night. She seems to be exhausted — lies ^\dth 
eyes wide open, but won’t talk.” 

Mrs. Glen met them at the front door. Her eyes 
were full of tears ; she advanced impatiently. 

“ I want you to go right straight to Theresa. 
Something terrible is the matter! I can’t get a 
word from her 1” 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


159 


He needed no second bidding. Mrs. Glen pre- 
ceded him to the wing-room where Theresa lay upon 
the couch, white and languid. She opened the door 
for hhn, closed it upon him, and stole softly away. 

He was alone with her — his beautiful love, lying 
there looking like a broken lily, with her thin hands 
folded over her bosom and her white lids closed. 
He knelt by her side and called her name softly. 

She opened her eyes, stared at him confusedly for 
a second ; then a rush of blood swept over her face, 
dyeing it a deep rose. She raised herself on one 
elbow by an evident effort : 

Hoes Doctor Murray come here as a physician 
or as an intruder she asked, icily. 

He was on his feet now, confused and remorse- 
ful. 

‘^Pardon me,” he said. ‘Ht was brutal. Your 
sister sent me here. I came with a heart full of 
anxiety. You were lying there so still and white 
that I forgot I had been sent as a physician, 
and remembered only that I suffered as a — lover.” 

It was a daring thing to do, but it was involun- 
tarj^ 

A lover ?” 

She repeated the words softly — so softly that they 
seemed to flutter over her white lips of their own 
accord. 

Yes, a lover !” 

He was on his knees by her side once more, hold- 


160 


A 8TRAN0E PILGRIMAGE. 


ing her hands tight clasped against his breast. She 
did not chide him. Her eyes were looking into his 
trustfully, serenely, tenderly — yes, longingly. 

You do not know what you are saying. Hone 
of 3^ou seem to see that I am dying.” 

“Dying! Why, what wild fancy is this? You 
have been careless, reckless — criminally indifferent 
to your health. See !” — he stooped and picked up a 
little slipper from beneath the lounge — “ is this a 
thing to wear from beneath the shelter of your 
home ? Oh, my darling ! don’t be afraid to tell me 
what it means ! You are under some spell cast upon 
you by an old man for purposes of his own. Let 
me help you to break that spell. See!” he went 
on, vehemently, not noting the wild, hunted look 
that had come into her eyes, “ I am going to tell 
you how brutal I have been ! I am going to tell 
you how I thought you were not above meeting 
your lover in a lonely grave-yard, or on the shores 
of the lake at midnight — how I have cursed myself 
for the infatuation that made me love you in spite 
of the things that told so against you. Only this 
morning, my sweet, when I found these witnesses of 
your presence m a boat, afloat out yonder on the 
lake, I could have killed you in my wrath ; but I 
said, ‘ I will go to her and ask her what it means. I 
will go to her and tell her that by the mighty love I 
bear her — by all the agony I have battled against 
for her sake — by all that man holds in highest 


A STI^A2^(?£; PILGRIMAGE. 


161 


e&teem in the woman he loves, I have a right to the 
truth !’ ” 

He laid the handkerchief and the crushed rose 
upon her white robe. 

“You will tell me, oh, my love, my incarnation 
of purity ! how came the rose you wore in your hair 
last night — now came that bit of cambric, that 
peeped so daintily from your silken bodice last 
night — to be lying, wet and crushed, in a floating 
boat, out yonder in the lake ? — a boat whose oars 
had 'been muffled so that the thief might easier do 
the bidding of his master — Satan! I have -suffered 
such torments for your sake this day, my darling, 
short as it has been ! How could I remember that I 
was but the doctor to you when they sent me in 
here 

He had spol^en rapidly and vehemently, carried 
away by his own passion, swept away by his fierce 
desire to pierce this mystery. Her eyes, which had 
been fastened on his in an intense gaze, ,were sud- 
denly cast upward. She lifted tke rose on high, 
laughed hysterically, flung her arms gut wildly, 
then lay still and white in his arms, with closed eyes 
and nerveless limbs. 


162 


A BTUAmE PILGBlMAaE. 


CHAPTEK XIII. 

A VISIT TO ALLIGATOR ISLAND. 

B y the LOKD, if she cannot^ he shall !” said 
Archibald Murray, between his clenched teeth, 
as he paced the long gallery at Glencove toward 
nightfall of the day that had left him worn physic- 
ally and mentally and stuped his fiery nature to its 
depths. 

Mr. Glen joined him as he got opposite the open 
fiont door. 

How is she ?” he asked, anxiously. 

It is hard to say,” Doctor Murray answered, 
gloomily. She seems to come out of one fainting- 
fit only to go into another. I should say her nerv- 
ous system has received a tremendous shock. Noth- 
ing but the most absolute quiet can relieve her.” 

“ But how could she receive a nervous shock ?” 
Mr. Glen asked, in an irritated voice. Do you find 
the material for nervous shocks anywhere about you 
on this sleepy old plantation ?” 

“ Miss Glen’s organization is a very highly-strung 
one.” 

“Yes, we have always known that.” 

“ But what you do not loiow is, all the influences — 


A PILGRIMAGE. 


163 


the exciting influences, I mean — ^that may have been 
brought to bear on it to produce this attack.” 

Thunder and lightning, Murray ! don’t we — ^you 
as well as I — see who she sees, and know where she 
goes and what she does all day long 

‘^All day long? Yes, pretty much, I suppose; 

but ” He broke off abruptly, then added, 

gravely : Glen, I wish you would send for Bemish. 
He has known your sister all her life — knows her 
constitution. I should like him to see her just as 
she is. I quite insist on it !” 

“ But we are perfectly satisfied with your man- 
agement of the case ! Pray don’t misunderstand 
my impatience just now !” 

I am not satisfied ! I want him sent for — I told 
Mrs. Glen so early this morning !” 

Mr. Glen took several turns along-side of Archi- 
bald in silence. It was not hard for Archibald to 
see that he was nervous and disturbed about some- 
thing. 

‘AVell, what is it ?” he asked, throwing the cigar 
he had been smoking as a sedative far out into the 
yard, as he turned to face his host. 

‘^Bemish is a confounded old churl!” Mr. Glen 
said, explosively and inconsequently. 

Then you did send for him ?” 

“ Yes, as you suggested it and seemed bent on it.” 

And he would not come ?” 

JIo ; confound him ! Said we ho^d one doctor in 


164 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


the house, and he knew the case did not require 
two. Fanny says perhaps it was because she wrote, 
instead of you.” 

“ By the Lord, he shall come ! I’ll fetch him my- 
self !” 

Archibald turned, with long, fierce strides, toward 
where his hat hung on the rack in the hall. His 
eyes were afiame with anger. 

‘‘My dear fellow, you don’t think the case so- 
urgent as all this comes to ?” Mr. Glen said, follow- 
ing him into the hall with an anxious face. 

“Urgent? Yes; but by no means unmanageable 
to any one who understands it ! I confess I do not. 

I beheve that Doctor Bemish does. I will say this 
much to you — that I never thought of liaving him 
called in until I heard your sister mutter his name 
when she was scarcely conscious of what she was 
saying. I think she wants him, and if lie is stand- 
ing on his dignity on account of my presence, then 
I am the one to bring him down off his stilts. 
That’s all there is to it !” 

Just at this juncture Mrs. Glen appeared noise- 
lessly, from somewhere in the rear, with the an- 
nouncement that tea was ready. 

“ You will have supper before you go ?” Mr. Glen 
said to Archie. 

“ Yes,” he answered ; I am going to pull myself 
across, and I can do it better on a cup of strong 
ooffee than without it,” 


A STJiAJVO^ PILGBIjYAGjSJ. 


165 


Going to pull yourself over where ?” Mrs. Glen 
asked, looking disturbed. She could not endure the 
thought of his being away from them one hour, 
with Theresa in such a strange condition. 

Over to Bemish’s,” said Mr. Glen, piling provis- 
ions on Archie’s plate with a liberal hand. ‘‘ He 
thinks that Thersie wants the old man, and that he 
may have some professional kink in his head, which 
he calls courtesy, that needs to be straightened out.” 

Oh,” said Mrs. Glen, quite reconciled ; but why 
not write a note and send it over by one of the 
boys ?” 

‘^The exercise will do me good,” said Archie, 
gulping down his hot colfee rapidly. I shall pad- 
dle over in the pirogue, as Bemish will want his own 
boat to go home in. Tliere’s nothing to do for Miss 
Glen but to obey orders you already have, rigidly, 
until I return Avith Bemish.” 

He gave these last directions Avhile stuffing his 
very-badly-folded napkin into its ring, and then was 
gone. 

The pirogue Avhich he selected in preference to 
the heavier two-oared boat was a shm-pointed canoe 
with room for but one person, and Avas propelled by 
a single noiseless paddle, dipped alternately on 
either side. The day had been a trying one to him, 
and he doubted his ability to roAv the heavier boat 
across to the Bemish place and back Avith any degree 
of promptness. He felt savagely disinclined to any 


166 


A PIieRIMAQE. 


companion, even the humble sort of a negro oars- 
man. 

Night had fallen while he lingered over the 
supper-table — a starless, moonless night that cov- 
ered the watery expanse over which he was making 
his way so noiselessly with a black canopy that 
made all things invisible. As the pirogue shot over 
the water, Murray found himself wondering why he 
had so studiously avoided mentioning to the Glens 
that he had by chance encountered Doctor Bemish 
that morning. He scarcely knew himself, unless, 
indeed, it was because this old man was a part of 
the inscrutable mystery that enveloped the woman 
who had become so strangely dear to him, and he 
could not bring himself to talk about her. He was 
about to do a very rash thing in order to dispel 
that mj^stery if a direct course could do it. He was 
going to tell Doctor Bemish aU that he had seen and 
all that he suspected. 

‘‘By the Lord,” he said again, fiercely, “if she 
cannot^ he shall explain it to me, if I have to take 
his life for it.” He plied his paddle with soft, swift 
strokes. 

The blackness of the water grew yet blacker. He 
was nearing the other shore. The shadows of the 
gloomy trees that outlined the Bemish yard fell 
across his way and deepened the shadows on the 
water. He dipped his one oar more cautiously and 
slowly now. He had only visited this spot twice 


A STRAmE PILGRIMA&E. 


167 


before, and that in broad daylight. He was quite 
sure he had touched the bank some yards above the 
proper landing-point. Lightly pushing the pirogue 
forward by tapping the bank with the paddle, he 
went on his noiseless way until his ear caught the 
sound of oars being arranged in their locks. The 
souud came from a little cove a yard or two beyond 
the spot where the pirogue was gliding along. There 
came a faint glow of phosphorescent light. Some 
one had struck a match ! By its transient glimmer 
he could see that the man in the boat, which was 
drifting out of the cove, was a white man. The 
match went out, and Archie heard an exclamation of 
impatience. A second match was struck — success- 
fully, this time. The man in the skiff held it to a cigar 
between his lips quite long enough for the man in 
the pirogue to discover that it was Doctor Bemish, 
and that he was about starting off on a nocturnal 
expedition of some sort. 

Archibald’s first impulse was to hail him, and 
bluntly tell him his errand then and there., His 
second was to avail himself of the chance thus acci- 
dentally afforded him of solving the mystery him- 
self. 

‘‘ Good God !” was his horrified reflection ; can 
he be devil enough to make her rise from that bed 
of sickness and come to him ? Perhaps I can best 
serve her by not losing sight of him.” He held his 
paddle poised ready for use. “ Lead on, my Prince of 


168 


A PILGRIM AO E, 


Darkness, and I will follow in your wake. Something 
must come of this night’s labor.” 

His cigar fairly alight, the old man in the boat 
settled the heavy oars in their muffled locks with 
weary arms. He had not meant to go back to the 
Island so soon. He had spent the past night there 
with George because he had wanted to report 
progress with Theresa ; but he had found the boy in 
need of some tools for a piece of mechanism he was 
perfecting there in his prison-house, and he had 
promised to bring them to him. This night he 
would be more careful about the boat. 

“He never would have asked it,” the old man 
sighed wearily, “ if he had known how nearly worn- 
out I am. A few more efforts and the truth will be 
out, George will be free, and I — no, nothing can 
make me strong again. I think the Lord is only 
letting me live until this task is finished. Then I 
shall depart in peace.” 

It was no difflcult task for the strong young rower, 
following stealthily in his wake, to keep as near to 
the tired old man as was desirable. The old man 
rowed slowly and laboriously. The young one 
paddled swiftly and noiselessly. The old man led 
unconsciously, the young one followed blindly — fol- 
lowed blindly, until once more the darker shadows 
of earth and tree fell across the smooth surface of 
the water, and the sound of the muffled oars he had 
been following suddenly ceased. A soft whistle 


A 8TEANQE PILGRIMAGE. 


169 


broke the intense stillness. Archie held his breath 
in surprise and suspense. It was answered by a 
whistle from the shore. He could hear the old man 
forcing his boat through the bushes. He propelled 
the pirogue a step or two nearer. He could hear a 
voice from above say : 

‘‘I hardly looked for you back to-night. I 
thought you were tired.” The voice was rich and 
cultured. 

A little — only a little,” said the old man cheer- 
fully ; but I thought you’d want the things as quick 
as you could get them, and I’ve got them all here 
for you.” 

So I did want them, but not at your expense. 
Look-out, there,; the bank’s crumbled some to-day. 
Give me your hand.” 

“ Ho, you take the things, and I can scramble up. 
Here — got ’em ?” 

“Yes, all right. How then, your hand.” 

He could hear the two men walk away together 
after the old man had clambered up the bank with 
the assistance of the hand that had been offered in 
the darkness. 

Without stopping to inquire why he should be 
thus playing the spy in this skulking fashion, Archi- 
bald Murray forced his pirogue in among the bushes 
and lightly sprang up the vine-tangled bank. He 
found himself surrounded by an impenetrable mass of 
greenery. At least impenetrable it seemed to him, 


170 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


standing there in its midst for the first time, with 
the darkness of an Egyptian night surrounding him. 

He made a blind step forward in the direction the 
voices seemed to lead him. The vines twined them- 
selves about his feet and brought him to his knees. 
He stumbled forward, pushing the briery branches 
that environed him aside with torn and reckless 
hands. If he once lost that distant murmur of 
voices his whole expedition would be a failure. 
What could he accomplish stumbling along there in 
the darkness over unknown ground ? His resolute 
progress was rewarded. He found himself in a 
path. A narrow one, to be sure — so narrow, that by 
stretching out either arm he could touch the rough 
bark of a tree or the thorny branches of some 
tropical bush ; but the ground under his feet had a 
beaten feeling. It had been trodden before — doubt- 
less had just been trodden by those men whose 
voices he was straining his ears to catch. Suddenly a 
wall of impenetrable foliage arose immediately in 
front of him, blocking his further progress and com- 
pleting his bewilderment. 

He stood still to collect his scattered senses. What 
had become of the voices and what had become of 
the path? Just then, apparently directly from out 
the mass of foliage that blocked his progress, came 
the words : 

“ Poor little thing ! I should hate to have it tell 
permanently on her health. Kather than that, let 


A FIZGJilMAGi:. 


in 


things stand as they are. Come, I was about to 
take a dip when I heard you whistle. Will you 
come with me or stay where you are ? The water’s 
too cold yet awhile for you, I suppose, but it puts 
new life into me. I take a plunge every night.” 

“ I will go with you. I have not told you yet that 
Theresa says ” 

The mass of foliage moved and seemed to open 
outward. Archibald Murray had but time to spring 
backward before the leafy covert swung back on 
its hinges, letting a flood of light pour out for a 
second ; then it was quickly shut. By that light he 
could see the owner of the rich 3^oung voice that had 
just uttered words which set his pulses to beating 
tumultuously. He had barely time to note that this 
man was tall, young, and exceedingly graceful in his 
movements. The leafy screen swung back into posi- 
tion. The two men, father and son, walked" away 
toward the shore. Archibald stepped from his place 
of concealment and groped for the latch to this 
cunningly-concealed door. It was not hard to find. 

“ He shall find me here when he comes back from 
his dip, this luxurious hermit, who speaks of that 
poor girl’s health as if it were but a matter of 
secondary consideration to his own comfort. Who 
in the foul fiend’s name is he ?” 

He was inside the hut now, and gazing about him 
amazedly. The crimson portieres that hid the rude 
walls were sprinkled thickly over with delicate little 


1^2 A 8TEAJ}rGE PILOEIMAGZ 

water-color sketches, with tiny models in bark of 
all sorts of water-craft, Avith masses of dried plants 
and autumn leaves fantastically arranged. Over the 
brazier of charcoal a brass kettle was sAvingmg, the 
Avater in it bubbling and singing merrily. On a side- 
table Avere the arrangements for tlie hermit’s sup- 
per. Books, flo AVer- jars, pictures, easels, boxing- 
gloves, chess-men, all the appointments of a luxuri- 
ously-inclined man of leisure filled the little room to 
its utmost capaeity. On a Avri ting-table in one 
corner lay an open blank-book, Avhose first pages 
were Avritten over in a close, fine, masculine hand. 
Archibald Murray closed it roughly. Perhaps here 
Avas a clew to the identity of this Sybaritish recluse. 

“ PriA^ate Diary of George Bemish ” Avas Avritten 
diagonally across the fly-leaf. lie inA^oluntarily 
turned the fly-leaf. He had no Aundication to offer 
for reading the Avords that stared hhn in the face : 

‘‘‘Before God I am innocent of the murder of 
Adrien Michelet ! There are only three persons in 
the Avorld Avho know this as Avell as I do. These 
three persons are my poor, heroic, patient old father, 
Theresa Glen, and Hugh Maury. But should I die 
on this Island, like a badger in his hole, I Avant all 
the Avorld to knoAv it. They Avill believe me after 
they read this, Avhich is to be made public at my 
death.’ 

“ I see it all ! I see it aU !” 

Archibald Murray threAV up his hands with a 


A sTiumB pimniMAos. 


m 


groan of despair. “ There is no mystery for me to 
solve — no insult for me to avenge. It is the secret 
of his whereabouts she is guarding. It is for his 
sake she braves the pestilential breath of night and 
comes here to bless him with her sweet presence. 
It is for their sakes the old man turns ferry-man 
and conveys her to his side. Ho mystery, no wrong, 
no insult. Only truth, and loving loyalty, and pa- 
tient endurance ! 

My love, my sweet, thank God I covlAnot believe 
evil of you, as much as appearances were against 
you ! Hot mine to strip from them the poor solace 
of these stolen meetings !” 

He stole away softly from the spot where George 
Bemish was spending his useless life. He closed the 
leafy screen as carefully as if a sleeping child lay 
among its swaying branches. Bruised, breathless, 
sick at heart, he groped his way back to the pirogue. 

An hour later he stood before Mr. and Mrs. Glen, 
white and wearied. 

How is she were his first words. 

“ She has not moved since you left. Has slept 
like an angel,” said Mrs. Glen, fervidly. 

Has slept like herself, then,” said Archie, with 
an expressibly pathetic smile. 

“ But you ?” said Mrs. Glen, anxiously ; you look 
so tired and white. You have done too much for us 
to-day.” 

“Honsense!” he said, with a futile attempt at 


lU ■ ^ STUArnE PlLGUIMAaS. 

cheerfulness. “The water and the night-air to- 
gether have made me look a trifle ghastly, no doubt ; 
they always do.” 

“ How about Bemish Mr. Glen asked. 

Could not find him,” said Archibald, without 
flinching. But if Miss Glen is still sleeping, per- 
haps she may not need him, after all.” 

“ Will you see her before going to bed ?” 

“Ho. She does not need me, either.” 

He said it with such a strange gruffness in his 
voice, with such a hopeless look in his eyes, that 
when he turned immediately on his heel and left 
them Mrs. Glen looked at her husband and said, 
wonderingly : 

“ Did you ever ?” 

“ Frequently,” said Mr. Glen, with a troubled smile, 
“ where Thersie is concerned.” 

“Leonard,” said Mrs. Glen, solemnly, “for a 
really good woman, I think your sister Theresa has 
inflicted an awful amount of suffering.” 

“ I think so, too. But what are we going to do 
about it ?” 

“ nothing,” his wife answered, unsatisfactorily. 


A STEAJ^OE PILGRIMAGE, 


175 


CHATEE XTY. 

MAD PAEMELIE AT HOME. 

T he show mantles that had kept the flower- 
germs warm all winter had melted at the first 
breath of spring. The crocuses were hfting their 
yellow heads above the brown earth-crust, and the 
snow-drops were hanging their pure, white beiis on 
their fragile stems before Hetty’s mother and 
Hetty’s doctor relaxed their stern vigilance and 
gave her the blessed freedom of action she pined for 
so restlessly. 

The winter had been one of horror to her. She 
had only 'been permitted glimpses of the outside 
world through closed sashes and stuffy woolen cur- 
tains. She was thin and pale, and the thinner and 
paler she got the more they enveloped her in wool- 
ens, and the more closely they confined her to the 
house, which to her excited imagination was but a 
repository of dead men’s secrets and the haunt of 
ghostly visitants. 

The sighs and restless movements of some unquiet 
spirit disturbed her days and nights. If those un- 
explained sounds had caused her simply vulgar ter- 
ror, she would long since have fled from the little 
room where alone they were ever heard. She had 
gone to every room in the house when no one was 


176 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


in them ; had sat in them with folded hands and 
strained ears, listening, longing, hoping she might 
hear those same despairing sighs and weary foot- 
steps that came to her alone in her own room. 

“ It is because this was my cousin’s room,” the 
girl had decided for herself, looking lovingly up into 
the bright-faced portrait that hung over her mantel- 
piece, ‘'that my Uncle Richard’s spirit comes back 
here. If only he would think me good enough to 
be his messenger to the boy he loved so well 1” 

More than once she had stretched out her little, 
thin hands toward those ghostly sounds, pleading 
audibly that she might be found worthy to do the 
bidding of her ghostly visitant. 

“What would you have him know, my uncle? 
Can you not teU me ? He has forgotten me — has 
gone where I could not even persecute him with a 
letter ; but he would welcome me if I came with a 
greeting from you, oh, my uncle! and I would 
search the wide world over to bear it to him ; for — 
oh, the spirits know it — I love him ! I love him !” 

These frenzied moments of exaltation would leave 
her unnerved and exhausted, and then Mrs. Ogden, 
in a fright, would send for Doctor Yernon ; and 
Doctor Yernon, acting according to his lights, would 
mix a fresh lot of pills and leave a new sort of mixt- 
ure, perhaps a trifle nastier than the last, and 
would prescribe oatmeal for her breakfast, and con- 
fidently promise Mrs. Ogden that if all his directions 
were followed, Hetty would soon be quite herself 
again. 

Apart from a mild sort of anxiety conc^ning 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


in 


Hetty, Mrs. Ogden Tvas in an unusually placid frame 
of mind that first winter of her return to the home 
of her childhood. Things were moving much more 
smoothly than she had anticipated. 

The neighbors having attended her big dinner out 
of curiosity and interest in her handsome and 
heroic tutor, came again to inquire after Miss 
Ogden, whose prolonged illness touched the quick 
sympathies of their warm Virginia hearts, until 
social recognition had been accorded the returned 
native almost unconsciously. 

Then the tutor had really turned out to be a 
treasure. ISTo one had ever obtained such mastery 
of the Ogden boys. She would gladly have taken 
a long lease of him, but he refused to engage for 
more than one month at a time. 

“Ho,” he would say, firmly ; “I am only resting 
and accumulating strength for my pilgrimage. I 
have laid my snares in many places ; somewhere, 
sometime, I will find niy friend and carry him home 
in triumph.” 

Again, she had gotten rid of Archibald Murray 
much more easily than she dared hope for. He had 
never been heard from since writing back for his 
books. He had not, even then, vouchsafed her any 
information concerning himself. 

I suppose he is not starving,” she said to herself, 
comfortably, “or I should have heard from him 
quick enough.” 

Yes, things were going quite to suit Mrs. Ogden; 
and now that the crocuses were out and the hyacinth- 
buds swelling, she might open Hetty’s prison-barsr 


178 


A STRANaE PILGRIMAGE, 


She was glad to see that in the limited intercourse 
circumstances had permitted between Hetty and the 
boys’ tutor there had been none of that shyness, 
none of that pretty maneuvering for proximity, 
none of those furtive proceedings which bespeak the 
incipient love-affair.. 

Hetty and Hugh Maury met three times a day at 
the table, and in the parlor of evenings, when she 
would be at the piano, or in the chapel, when he 
Avould be at the organ. Each seemed to enjoy the 
liarmony evoked by the other in a purely imper- 
sonal manner. 

Everything is just as it should be,” Mrs. Ogden 
said, placidly, turning from the window, where she 
had just caught a glimpse of Hugh Maury stalking 
across the fields in the direction of Doctor Vernon’s 
house, to go and let Hetty out for a ramble on her 
own responsibility. 

The morning is just delicious,” she said, tying a 
blue silk handkerchief about Hetty’s neck with ma- 
ternal solicitude ; “ and just so you don’t linger in 
shady, damp spots, you are at liberty to spend the 
whole morning out under this glorious spring sun- 
shine.” 

Glorious, indeed !” said Hetty, her eyes dancing 
as she walked tentatively from one end of the long 
gallery to the other, undecided in which direction 
she should take her flight. 

Where are the boys, mother ? I shouldn’t mind 
taking one of them with me.” 

It’s Saturday, and there’s a circus in town, so 
there’s no use asking me where the boys are. Mr* 


A STRAm:^ PILGRIMAQK 

Maury has gone over to take his Saturday dinner 
with the Yernons, as usual.” 

I shouldn’t want him if he hadn’t,” said Hetty, 
bounding down the steps with a light-hearted laugh. 

It’s done me good already, mother — this sweet, 
sweet air. Don’t be troubled if you don’t see me 
before sunset. I promise not to get drowned 
again.” 

Mrs. Ogden turned toward the house as Hetty, 
like a bird set free, ran across the lawn, declaring 
she hadn’t yet made up her mind which way to go. 

If this last surviving member of the Dabney 
family could be said to have a ruling passion, it was 
for novel-reading— novel-reading of that fervid, 
absorbed description which tinged her fancies in 
early girlhood, guided or misguided her conduct in 
maturer years, and finally became a sedative and a 
solace. 

She was in a specially complacent mood this 
morning. She had made aU of her children happy, 
and now she would enjoy the rest of the day in her 
own fashion. 

Hetty was taking her enjoyment in another 
fashion. In the aimless manner of a butterfly she 
flitted across the fields where the hands were turn- 
ing up the sweet-smeUing earth with keen, sharp 
plow-blades — now stooping to fill her hands with 
the red clover-blossoms, now tiptoeing to reach a 
spray of plum-blossoms for the adorning of her 
hat-band. 

An hour of this unusual exercise found her tired 
beyond her expectations. Uncle Kichard’s bench,” 


180 


A ^TRAmE PlWRIMAaE. 


on the promontory, was the only dry resting-place 
that suggested itself. By a circuitous route through 
the fields she reached it, and threw herself upon it 
in a condition of fatigue that quite irritated her. 

I am of no account !” she said aloud. “ Just liter- 
ally of no account !” 

This was the first time she had been on the prom- 
ontory since she had made that daring expedition 
across the river on skates. The river lay spread out 
before her now, running swiftly and merrily be- 
tween its green banks. Eeleased from its icy fet- 
ters, it was a charming object in the landscape. 
The land on the opposite side lay much lower than 
on the Dabney side. She could sit there on her 
sunny bench, with her feet prudently poised on the 
roots of the oak, and take in a wide panoramic 
view of homely industry on the other side. 

There was the old ferry-man, mending a very 
dirty dip-net, in preparation for the coming of the 
fishing season ; there was his wife, planting her early 
potatoes in the truck-patch ; beyond were the broad 
fields that belonged to mad Parmelie Eose, wher^ 
the plows were running and the plowmen whistling 
as merrily as if there were no iron bars to the 
windows of one of the rooms in the big, gray house 
which Hetty could just see now, veiled by the pale- 
green of the early foliage on the trees that stood 
all around it. 

The sun waxed hotter. She meant to be very 
prudent, this time — just to sit still and enjoy the 
sunshine until she was quite rested, and then go back 
to the house in a leisurely way. But certainly that 


A BTMAmE PILGRIMAGE:, 


181 


blue silk handkerchief coiled about her neck was 
just a trifle too much. She unwound it and gave it 
a little shake to free it of wrinkles. 

When she had folded it and put it in her jacket- 
pocket, and turned her eyes once more on the placid 
scene before her, old Isham, the ferry-man, was just 
pushing his boat out into the stream. She watched 
him as he propelled it across the stream with quick, 
long strokes ; but it was only when he stood up in the 
boat, with his hat in his hand, and sent his voice up 
to the promontory, that she felt responsible for his 
movements. 

Here’s me. Missy !” 

Mercy !” Hetty sprang violently to her feet. 
“ I had entirely forgotten I told him that when he 
saw a blue silk handkerchief waving he must come 
in a hurry. I must pay him for his trouble.” 

She went down the steep path with unselfish con- 
sideration only in her heart. I can go down better 
than he can climb up,” she said to herself. 

.The boat was clean and trim. The old man 
greeted her cordially. She wished she might take a 
little row. But she had promised to be very 
prudent. 

“ It was a mistake this time, uncle. I didn’t mean 
to wave for you. I was just taking my handker- 
chief from my neck. But I am going to pay you, all 
the same,” she said, feeling for her purse. 

A disappointed look came over the old man’s face. 
“ISTever min’ ’bout the money. Missy. I thought 
maybe you was goin’ to see po’ Miss Kose. She ben 
beggin’ so hard to see yo’ ma. Yo’ ma, when she 


182 ^ STHAmS: PILOMMAQR 

Avas Miss Aggie Dabney, and our Miss Kose were 
mighty thick, honey.’’ 

‘‘ And she wants to see mother now ! Wh}^ did 
not somebody let her know ?” 

‘‘ She do know. Missy ; I went up to the big house 
and tol’ Miss Aggie myself.” 

‘‘ Told her what ?” 

‘‘ Tol’ her that Mars’ John say Miss Kose could. i’ 
poss’ble hoi’ out much longer, an’ how it would be a 
ac’ of mercy to come and see her.” 

And what word did my mother send back ?” 

She say you was too ill for her t’ lef yo’ side day 
nu’ night.” 

That was true,” said Hetty, only too glad to 
shield her mother from the suspicion of heartless- 
ness. ‘‘ I have been very sick for a long time. Who 
is Mr. John ?” 

He’s Miss Eose’s brother which I tol’ you ’bout 
las’ time. Missy. He’s jis’ naterally wear in’ himself 
out try in’ to tek keer uv Miss Kose. He say she 
shan’t go to no ’sylum while hes head’s hot.” 

“ He must be a good man.” 

‘‘ God never made no better. But Miss Kose 
wants to see women-folks sometimes, an’ they’s all 
’fraid uv her now.” 

“I’m not afraid of her,” said Hetty, stepping 
daringly into the boat and seating herself, “ and I am 
going to see her if you think I can walk that far. 
I’ve been sick ever since I fell into the river that 
day, and I’m ridiculously weak.” 

“ Tain’t no furder then from you’ bench up to yo’ 
big house, Missy ; an’ fore de lawd you do look so 


A 8mAm:Bj pilqeimaoe. 


18e3 


much lak Miss Aggj usen to look when her and our 
Miss Eose was so thick that mebbe you kin fool her 
into thinkin’ you is Miss Aggy. De recordin’ angil 
wouldn’t sot down that sort er lie ag’in folks — would 
he, Missy 

“We will risk it, anyhow,” said Hetty, smiling 
reassurance into the perplexed face of the honest 
old man, whose faithful soul longed to carry some 
comfort to his desolate “ w’ite folks.” 

“ Y ou shill ride the ol’ mar’ up to the house, 
Missy. She’s jis’ as gentle as a sick kitten.” 

“ And about as. slow,” said Hetty, with a laugh. 

“ Fo’ legs is better than two.” 

“ And it will be the quickest way. I must not 
get back to the house too tired, you know, or mamma 
won’t let me out soon again.” 

Isham fulfilled his promise of having her in the 
saddle “ in a jiffy.” 

She would have scorned to take that short ride if 
she had been in her normal condition. So short was 
it that she seemed scarcely to have lost sight of the 
big potato the ferry-man’s wife was cutting the 
“ eyes ” out of before she, perched on the back of 
the old mare, was pleading for help to open the gate 
that led into the front yard of Parmelie Pose’s 
house. 

She directed this call for help to a man whom she 
saw stooping over a flower-bed immediately in front 
of the house. He was the only person in sight. 

He straightened his back at the sound of her 
girlish voice, shoved his hat from off his brows, and 
looked at her in undisguised amazement. 


184 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


“ Oh said Hetty, under her breath, “ that must 
be Mr. John.” 

Throwing the bridle over the gate-post, she slipped 
from the saddle and walked quickly toward him, 
leaving her beast on the outside. 

I beg your pardon, sir,” she said, with a bright . 
smile, before he had at all recovered from his sur- 
prise. “I thought I was ordering some uncle or 
other to open the gate for me. I suppose this is 
Mr. Eose.” 

‘‘That is my name. And yours, my child ?” 

“ Is Hetty Ogden.” 

A dark shadow flitted across the worn face of the 
man, who had evidently been gardening before her 
invasion. He glanced restlessly toward the windows 
of the house before which they were standing. 
Hetty’s glance followed his. She shuddered. There 
were iron bars to all the windows of the room that 
looked out upon the flower-beds. 

“ She is there ?” 

“Yes, she is there. She is asleep now, but she 
has had an unusually trying day, poor child.” 

He passed his hand wearily over his forehead and 
pushed back the long white locks that Avere falling 
over it ; his face, lighted by a pair of gentle brown 
eyes, Avas so full of suffering that Hetty said, in- 
voluntarily : 

“ And so have you !” 

“That goes for nothing. The one involves the 
other.” 

“ She wanted to see my mother ?” 

“ Yes, She fancies that she has something on her 


A S27iAmi^ PILGRIMAGE. 185 

mind that must be told to Mrs. Ogden alone. You 
know the mentally diseased are very fanciful. I 
think it would have done her good if Mrs. Ogden 
could have come to her. But I do not blame her — 
not at all, not at all. There are some things no one 
can help us to bear. This is one of them. It was 
selfish of me to even ask it.” 

It was a noble face into which she was looking ! 
A face full of the sweetness, and the light, and the 
strength of a soul that had been tried in the furnace 
of affliction and come out of it pure silver. 

I am going to make her think her old friend has 
come to her,” said Hetty. They say I look as my 
mother used to at my age.” 

You do — and you don’t !” said John Kose, 
scanning the pure young face before him with seri- 
ous eyes. “ There is something more in your face 
than there was in Agnes’ !” 

Then you, too, knew my mamma ?” 

^^Knew her ? Yes. Why, I thought mothers 
were fond of telling daughters about their con- 
quests! But Parmelie- — you say you would not 
be afraid to go in to her ?” 

“Ho — not one particle.” 

“You are very young, my child, to come in con- 
tact with such a wreck. My poor Parmelie ; she 
was as fair and as light-hearted as you are, once.” 

A shrill scream from the windows behind them 
made Hetty start violently. She turned her fright- 
ened eyes toward the barred windows. Two long, 
thin arms were stretched out toward her through 
the cold iron bars, and a shrill voice cried : 


186 


A BTRAmS PimRIMAaR. 


“ Agnes ! Agnes ! I thought she would come ! 
Quiqk — come quick ! I’ve got so much to tell you !” 

Hetty trembled violently. Her cheeks blanched, 
and she stood irresolute until John Kose broke the 
spell. 

“It is too much for you, poor child. You shall 
not go. I am sorry she has seen you, but I can 
quiet her by telling her 

“You shall quiet her by telling her nothing. I 
am going to her. Only ” — she made a step forward, 
then turned her lovely eyes pleadingly on him — 
“ you will come with me 

“I will go with you, and see that no physical 
harm can possibly befall you,” he said, drawing her 
hand within his arm. 

“ Then I shall not be afraid at all,” she said, “ but 
will be glad if my coming can comfort her in any 
way.” 

The next moment she was alone in the iron-barred 
room that mad Parmelie Kose called home. 


A PILGRIMAGE, 


187 


CHAPTEK Xy. 

HETTY SHAKES PAEMELIE KOSe’s SECEET. 

I AM AFKAID it has been too much for you, my 
poor child,” said John Eose, half an hour later, 
as he lifted Hetty into the saddle and felt her trem- 
bling in every limb ; but I believe you have done 
her good.” 

She has done me good,” said Hetty, trying to 
smile away the concern in the gentle, patient face of 
the prematurely old man before her. 

“ Done you good ?” 

Yes. She has taught me how to be faithful and 
true even though the very light of reason be ex- 
tinguished ; and memory, one would think, would 
cease to remind one of promises and vows made long 
ago.” 

‘^Eemember,” said John Eose, gravely, ‘‘you 
have been listening to the ravings of a poor creature 
whose word all the world sets at naught.” 

“Hot all the world. I do not set it at naught.” 

“ Perhaps it was selfish of me to let you go in to 
her. But her sands of life are almost run, and I be- 
lieve, if she could unburden herself of her fancied 
obligations, her latter days would be more peaceful,” 
he said in apologetic tones. 

“ Mr, Eose,” said Hetty, impulsively, “ of course 


188 ^ STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 

you know what her fancied obligations, as you call 
ihem^ are 

‘‘Of course.’’ 

“ And you believe that there is no foundation for 
them in facts — in the facts of her past life, I 
mean 

“None whatever. Had I, I never would have 
permitted you to listen to her ravings.” 

“I am glad I went to her — glad I have heard 
what she had to say. I am glad that to the very 
last she believed she was talking to my mother. 
She called me ‘ Agnes ’ all the time.” 

“ Poor, poor Parmelie ! You would scarcely be- 
hove, to see her now, that at one time she was the 
brightest, merriest, prettiest girl in all this part of 
Virginia.” 

Hetty leaned toward him from the saddle and put 
her hand into his as she said, with a world of pity 
in her fresh, young voice : 

“ Mr. Eose, from all that I can learn, the Dabney 
family have been the bane of the Eose family. 
Don’t you hate the very name of Dabney ?” 

“ Hate it ? Dear child, up to the hour of his death 
Dick Dabney was one of my very best friends! 
And as for Agnes — well, small blame to her that she 
preferred dashing Dan Ogden to me. I’ve always 
been a slow-coach, you know. Dan was worth 
twenty of me. I see! I see! You’ve been taking 
what Parmelie has said too seriously — yes, too seri- 
ously, by far.” 

“How could I take it too seriously? Oh, how 

Qouldir 


A STRAJ^GB PILGRIMAGE. 


189 


A patient sigh was his only answer. 

She settled her tiny foot in the stirrup and broke 
a switch from the branches of the willow under 
which she had tethered the old mare. She was 
waxing nervous. He removed his hand from the 
bridle and stepped back. 

am coming again,” she said, touching the 
mare’s bony flanks briskly with the willow switch. 
She looked back after she had gone a few rods. He 
was standing there abstractedly, with his hat in his 
hand. The wind caught his long, white hair and 
toyed with it. It was in sharp contrast with his 
dark eyes and erect form. She waved him another 
farewell with her hand. He returned it with his 
broad palmetto hat. Then, as the leisurely old 
mare bore her deliberately from his sight, he turned 
back to his gardening with a sigh. It was not a 
very laborious sort of gardening he was engaged in. 
He always kept two or three beds of bright annuals 
in bloom, when possible, for Parmelie’s benefit. She 
used to love flowers so dearly ; and even now, the 
bright blaze of a bed of zinnias, or gladioli, or 
dahlias, would extract exclamations of childish de- 
light from her. There was so little left that gave 
her happiness! He believed he understood the 
source of that delight better this brilliant spring 
morning than ever before. Hetty had come to him 
as the zinnias and the dahlias came to Parmelie — 
bringing with her a sense of refreshment and 
relief. 

‘‘ Poor child, poor child; if only it does her no 
harm,” he said, bending to crumble the rich brown 


190 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


mold between his hands before dropping into it 
the seed that he meant to sow. 

. Parmelie, too, had sown seed that day ! 

‘^An’ you won’ stop and take a bite er lunch, 
Missy, befo’ crossin’ over ag’in?” Isham asked, 
preparing to lead the mare back to the feed-trough 
that was nailed against a tree behind his little 
cabin. 

‘^ISTo, I’m in an awful hurry. I’ll go down to the 
boat and wait there for you,” Hetty said, restlessly 
moving toward the bank. 

Isham looked at her persuasively, as he said, 
with hospitable persistence : W’en I tol’ the oF 

woman. Missy, that you was gone up to the 
big house to see our poo’ Miss Kose, she was that 
proud that she put the bigges’ sweet ’tater she could 
find in the pump smack in de ashes to ros’ fur you, 
an’ she skim de cream off’n a whoF pan o’ milk fo’ 
you, an’ she say : ^ "When Missy come back I lay 
she’ll think this a first-class lunch.’ An’ it were, 
too. Many’s the lunch Miss Parm’ly an’ Miss 
Aggie is et in that same cabin, w’en they cross over 
to see each other. An’ she ’low, my oF woman, 
you would tell us what you think, of Miss Parm’ly’s 
chances.” 

I am not a doctor, you know, so I have not any 
right to say ; but I am afraid she is very weak. I 
can’t stop for lunch to-day, because mamma will 
scold. This is the first time they’ve let me out; 
but I am coming again — coming soon, too.” 

That’s good news. It don’ seem right to me an’ 
the oF woman, you know, that our Miss Parm’ly 


A jsrnAmM piLaRiMAM\ 191 

should be forsook of the quality. You see, she 
were always one of ’em.” 

But Hetty’s impatience to be put across the nar- 
row river was too apparent not to impress itself 
upon him. 

He gave over persuasion, and in a few minutes 
had her safely at the base of the narrow foot-path, 
which looked tiresomely steep to her in her weakened 
condition. She would take a short cut home, not by 
way of the bench. She hoped somebody might 
have called in her absence. Company always left 
her mother in an indulgent mood. 

“ There !” She was on top of the hank, and had 
just recalled the fact that when sitting on the bench 
she had slipped her feet from out her rubbers. 

It will never do to go home without them,” she 
heard some one say, and glancing toward the bench 
she saw her rubbers held aloft by Hugh Maury. 

She laughed, and walking quickly toward him re- 
lieved him of the overshoes. 

‘^You certainly do seem destined to keep me 
straight at this end of the line. Did mother send 
you to see if I had been drowned again ?” 

“Ho. I have not been at the house since early 
morning.” 

“ And it is now ” 

“ After two.” 

“ Mercy !” 

“ You are expecting a scolding? Perhaps you de- 
serve one ; but to my way of thinking, unless you 
happen to feel hungry, the longer you stay out in 
this delicious sunshine the better.” 


192 


A STBAmE PILGRIMAGE. 


“ That’s my way of thinking, too,” said Hetty, 
settling herself comfortably on the hard, wooden 
bench, ‘^and I don’t happen to be at all hungry. 
Have just refused a sumptuous offer of roast sweet 
potato and cream, over yonder.” 

She pointed to the ferry-man’s cabin. 

‘‘You have a partiality for that side of the river,” 
the tutor said, looking down upon the scene of her 
rescue. “I am glad you made the voyage safely 
this time.” 

“ A most unselfish congratulation, all things con- 
sidered,” she said, looking at him brightly. There 
was something in his face that put to flight all 
desire to jest. . 

“ I am afraid you are very tired,” she said. “ I 
know how tiresome our boys can be. I thought you 
always spent this day with dear old Doctor Yernon.” 

“As a general thing, lYlo. In fact, I left the 
house for that purpose this morning. But my 
morning’s mail did not tend to raise my spirits, and 
I thought I would only be an infliction on my good 
friend.” 

“ Everybody in this world is in trouble, I do be- 
lieve,” said Hetty, puckering her brows quaint!}^. 
“It’s awful — just perfectly awful. I hope your 
trouble is not of a very bad sort.” 

She looked so sweet and sympathetic, but, withal, 
so pale and fragile, that the tutor’s conscience smote 
him for even vaguely hinting at his own sources of 
gloom in her presence. 

“Hot very bad,” he said, with assumed cheerful- 
ness. “I have one friend in my old home who 


A STBA^^G^ PILGRIMAGE, 


193 


writes me very fully occasionally, and this time he 
mentions the illness of a very dear friend, who is 
being attended by a new doctor — and a young one. 
I took it upon me to get irritated at the chances of 
so precious a life being left at the mercy of an inex- 
perienced physician — that is all. You see, my trouble 
was manufactured.” 

new doctor — and a young one!” Hetty said 
softly, to herself ; then, by a sudden impulse, to him : 

“ What is the name of this new doctor you don’t 
approve of ?” 

I really could not say, without referring to the 
letter.” 

Then refer to it.” • 

Her tones were so sharp, and her manner so im- 
perative, that he looked at her in resentful astonish- 
ment. 

“ I beg your pardon. How rude I did sound. 
But I want very much to know if the name is Mur- 
ray — Archibald Murray ?” 

He had the letter open in his hand by this time. 

Yes — Archibald Murray. Ho you know him ?” 

Know him ? Why, have you never heard that 
this place belonged to my Cousin Archibald Murra}^ 
before we came here? Have neither mother nor 
the boys ever spoken about hhn to you ? Is he so 
completely forgotten ?” 

It would seem that he is not forgotten at all,” 
said Hugh Maury, smiling into her flushed face. 

Hot by me. Oh, no 1 I can never forget my 
Cousin Archibald ! But he never writes to us. He 
thinks we wronged him, and — I am afraid we did.” 


194 


A STBAWGB PILOBIMAGE, 


“ Had we not better put the rubbers on now and 
go back to the house f ’ Hugh asked, abruptly. “ I 
think I should receive some compensation for mak- 
ing such a suggestion, for I am sure it would be 
much pleasanter to sit here in the sunshine and talk ; 
but I don’t imagine either one of us will receive 
commendation.” 

You are reproving me for talking about family 
affairs. You don’t think it nice of me.” 

I am only the tutor. Miss Ogden, and only the 
tutor for a short while. Presently I shall be a pil- 
grim again. Perhaps you would be sorry, then, to 
think I held any knowledge of your family affairs. 
It might mak(fyou uncomfortable. That is what I 
wish to prevent.” 

He had bent upon one knee to put on her over- 
shoes, and was looking up into her face with those 
great dark eyes of his, Avhich never lost their cast 
of solemn gloom. It was as if he were doomed to 
dwell forever in the shadow of his own past. 

‘‘Ho,” she said, looking back aT him fearlessly. 
“ I should not feel uncomfortable ; for wherever 
you went — completely out of my life, it might 
be — I would not be afraid. I would know you in- 
capable of taking advantage of a girl’s indiscreet 
chatter. I am afraid I am indiscreet, but I could 
not be afraid to trust you.” 

She was in nowise prepared for the extraordinary 
reception her mild commendation met with. 

Hugh Maury, the grave, taciturn tutor, of whom 
she stood rather in awe than otherwise, there on his 
kneo before her, seized both her hands and; raised 


A J^TMANGB PILGRIMAGE. 


19 ^ 


them reverently to his lips. When he dropped 
them again there was a tear resting upon her soft 
white hand. 

It was the first time in this bitter exile from home 
and friends that a woman’s voice had spoken words 
of confidence to him — the first time that accents 
of womanly sympathy and pity had fallen upon his 
parched soul ! He had not known, himself, until 
that second, how he longed again to be one of the 
great human family wherein heart speaks to heart 
and soul responds to soul ! 

This he could never be. In one hot, rash moment 
he had thrown away forever his birthright of love 
and tenderness. Theresa Glen could never be any 
thing but a beloved memory to him. There was 
but one act that could even alleviate the load of re- 
morse and anguish that had driven him into exile, 
and made him feel like a thief whenever he won^ a 
smile of kindness or a friendly word from sweet, 
pure woman. 

He would find George Bemish, take him home in 
triumph to that tried and patient old man, and 
then — well, he never went beyond the moment when 
his strange pilgrimage should culminate in finding 
the man who was all this time suffering for his — 
Hugh Maury’s — crime. He had last heard of him 
in Canada. He had not cared to frustrate his own 
plan of expiation by braving that bleak climate in 
his enfeebled condition. 

He had tarried among warmer surroundings for 
the winter, husbanding his strength and his re- 
sources, until the spring should be fairly opened. 


196 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


Mrs. Ogden knew that May would find her without 
the invaluable services of her tutor. 

Hetty brushed the tear from her hand furtively. 

He is half French,” she said to herself, in extenu- 
ation of his fervor, ‘‘ and doesn’t know he is making 
himself absurd.” 

She was on her feet now, prepared to return to the 
house. Her gentle spirit would not let her leave 
him under the impression that she overrated that 
foolish outburst of his. He, too, had risen and 
walked away a few steps. 

‘‘I should like to ask you,” she said, timidly, ‘Hhe 
name of the post-ofiice from which your friend 
wrote. Would it be my cousin’s post-office, do you 
suppose ?” 

He turned a relieved face toward her. How 
sweet, and sensible, and comforting she was at all 
times. 

Without doubt,” he said. “You are quite wel- 
come to the lette'r. There is nothing in it of a pri- 
vate nature, and you may be able to glean some 
news of your cousin in its pages which I have 
failed to give you.” * 

'He extended it to herT She grasped it eagerly, 
and with a hurried, blushing “ Thank you,” almost 
ran away from him toward the house. 

“ I have blundered,” said Hugh Maury, lookiug 
after her, uneasily. “She is in love with that man, 
and if she knows how to read between the lines she 
will discover that he is in love with Theresa.” 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE, 


197 


CHAPTEE XYI. 

HETTY LOCATES THE GHOST. 

H etty was glad Mrs. Telfair St. Leger had 
called on her mother that morning during 
her own absence. The St. Legers were the mry 
first,” and now that Mrs. St. Leger had called and 
invited Mrs. Ogden to dinner there was nothing 
left for Mrs. Ogden to complain of, as far as the old 
neighbors were concerned. She was glad, too, that 
the boys had been to the circus. They were so brim- 
ful of its marvels that nothing was simpler than for 
her to sit silent throughout the entire evening unob- 
served in the parlor, with her crochet-work in her 
hand, while she allowed her thoughts to wander at 
will. She was glad, too, that Hugh Maury had 
what Eob called “ one of his musical fits on him,” 
and saw fit to spend his evening in the chapel, where 
the organ stood. He had closed the doors between 
him and the rest of the household, and only the 
most distant mutterings of the music could be heard 
above the nearer clatter which entered her ears in 
such confused snatches. 

She had had so much new material given her for 
thought that day. Parmelie Eose had made her 
understand why that ke}^ must be given to Mr. Dab- 
ney. (Poor Parmelie ! the intermediate facts of his 
death and burial had not been grasped by her.) 


198 


A STEAm^ PlLaklMAOE!. 


What the book which old Lucy had intrusted id 
her had to do with it all she was still ignorant of. 

If she could only find old Lucy 

I wish you could have seen her, Hetty,” she 
heard her mother’s voice, just then, above the inward 
tumult. She is a woman whom any young girl 
might take for a model. She walks and carries her- 
self like a queen. She spent all of last winter in 

Paris ; and such a bonnet as she did have on ” 

I could do it,” said Lem, with a swagger, in his 
shrill young voice. “You jus’ fix up a trapeze in 

the garret an’ lemme have a week’s practice ” 

“ I say, mother ! Het ! Lis’n. Lem’s goin’ to turn 
circus-rider ” 

“ And Hob’s been practising for my clown. He’s 
try in’ to say funny things now, only he don’t know 

how bad he’s missed it ” 

“ And her gloves ! Well, they fit like the skin on 
her hands. She’s a magnificent woman.” 

“ When are you going to dine there, mother 
“Hext Thursday. But I’m going to see Miss 
Spinnaker early Monday morning, to have her’ re- 
drape my old maroon satin. It’s time I was having 
something decent made, now that people are be- 
ginning to find out I am here to stay.” 

“ Mother, do you know where my Cousin Archi- 
bald is?” Hetty asked suddenly, at this most in- 
opportune moment. 

Mrs. Ogden frowned slightly. 

“What possessed the girl to ask that question 
just when she was feeling her serenest ?” she won- 
dered. 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


199 


Not positively,” she said, shortly. 

“ Have the books he asked for ever been sent 

N o,” still more shortly. “ To tell you the truth, I 
lost his letter with his address in it. If he had 
wanted them very badly, I suppose he would have 
written again. Doubtless he has forgotten all about 
them, and us too, by this time.” 

The girl dropped her head listlessly and busied, 
herself once more with her crochet-needles. No 
doubt her mother was right. Some lines in the 
letter Hugh Maury had given her to read came back 
to her over and over again : 

Miss Glen is said to be in delicate health, but 
doubtless she will pull through under the devoted 
ministrations of her young and handsome doctor, 
Murray, who has taken everything out of old 
Bemish’s hands. If possible, she grows more beauti- 
ful as time goes on.” 

Her cousin, then, was .doing well in a business 
way! And — he' was the devoted attendant of a 
beautiful woman 1 Food enough, this, for poor little 
Hetty’s fervid fancy. 

No wonder,” she said, passionately, as she read 
that fateful letter over in her own room that night 
for the third time, he does not care for a few musty 
old books, nor for his old home, nor for — for — any 
one of us.” 

There were tears in her eyes, and there was a 
sharp pain in her heart, as she stood with clasped 
hands before the bright-faced portrait over her 
mantel-shelf. T^^^^ Archibald 


200 


A PILGBIMAGE. 


Murray she was in love with — that, and the faithful 
memory of a first kiss ! 

“If Archibald Murray himself, grown graver, 
more serious, less sunny-faced, by far, than that 
youthful portrait of himself, could have suddenly 
placed himself in that richly-gilded frame, her sensa- 
tion would have been one of disappointment, per- 
haps ; after which, healthy and inevitable disillusion- 
ment ! 

As it was, the portrait smiled down heartlessly on 
her tear- wet face as she stood there in that worship- 
ful attitude, with her great, earnest eyes fixed upon 
it. 

“ But that makes no difference,” she said aloud, 
more calmly, turning from the portrait toward her 
dressing-table. 

“No difference in what Parmelie Bose has told 

me. I must make sure of that, and then How 

strange that on the very day poor Parmelie gave me 
her directions, I should get his address ! God must 
have ordered it just so.” 

A sigh — a heavy, weary sigh ! Then the restless, 
slow shuffling of uncertain footsteps — just over 
her bureau one moment, the next above the tall 
tester of the bed. It did not even startle her now. 
She had grown to look for it, almost. 

“Yes,” she said, softly, addressing herself to the 
fancied spirit of her Uncle Bichard. “He shall 
know it, my uncle, he shall know it all, if I have to 
take the box to him with these hands of mine. I 
will trust it to no hands but mine. 

“ I want to see him ; I want to see her. Oh, I 


A STRANGE PILQniMAGB. * 201 

want to look at the woman who has made him for- 
get his home so soon 

Poor little Hetty. She had a shrine in this dingy 
little room, before which she knelt every night. 
Only an old school-desk — an old, battered, paintlesS 
desk. But in it she kept her Bible, and with her 
head resting on it she poured out her nightly prayer. 
Such pure supplications, from a pure young heart, as 
were these prayers that floated heavenward from 
the region of Archibald Murray’s old school-desk ! 

To-night she lifted its lid and took from it the 
black book old Lucy had given into her keep- 
ing with so much mystery and importance. How 
many times, during her dreamy confinement to the 
house, had she sat and idly turned its pages over 
and over. It was an old Latin grammar, absolutely 
meaningless to her. The Dabneys were great peo- 
ple for heir-looms. She had often smiled at the stress 
her mother would lay on an old bit of lace, or a bat- 
tered silver cup, because it had been in the family so 
long. Doubtless this old grammar was a Dabney heir- 
loom. But to-night the old grammar yielded up its 
secret in the most startlingly unexpected manner. It 
had been thriftily covered by some thrifty member of 
the family in a by-gone day with black glazed- 
muslin. This muslin cover was an offense to Hetty, 
who was fastidiously neat in all things. 

How that I know Avhere he is,” she said, snip- 
ping with her pocket-knife the threads that sewed 
the cover, “ I will mail it to him, but not in this 
soiled condition.” 

She lifted the freed book from its dusty covering. 


202 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


It looked respectably clean and modern after slough- 
ing the black shell, Avhich she flung carelessly aside. 
A small sheet of paper, which from long pressure 
had grown adhesive, fell from between the black 
muslin cover and the calf-skin of the binding proper. 
It was folded once, for convenience of shape. She 
unfolded it wonderingly, and spread open on the 
desk before her a half-sheet of note-paper closely 
written over in a delicate, feminine hand. At the 
bottom of the sheet was the name Lavinia Mur- 
ray, and the note was addressed to her dear son, Ar- 
chibald Murray. On the back of it was this in- 
dorsement : 

In case this should fall into the hands of any one'' 
but Archibald Murray, I must trust to their honor 
and humanity to see that the leather wallet full of 
letters, which will be found in a drawer in the 
armoire of my brother’s attic, be put into his hands, 
if possible; if not pQssible, let them be destroyed 
unopened. I feel convicted of cowardice in the 
manner of this proceeding ; but I dare not disturb 
the present peaceful and loving condition of affairs 
under this roof. I am afraid of Kichard’s re- 
proaches. 

I know I cannot live very much longer — perhaps 
only a few months. He loves the boy, and when I 
am gone they Avill be all in all to each other. I 
have already told him that the book, which he does 
not know is to contain this, is to be given to my son 
when he returns from college, not before, with in- 
structions to examine it thoroughly from cover to 
cover. 

If the letters, which Archibald Murray will find in 
the leather wallet upstairs, are to make any great 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


m 


change in his life, I want it to come after he has 
been fitted by a college education to make his OAvn 
way in life. 


I hope my dear brother Eichard, and the boy for 
whose sake I have consented to act deceitfully and 
cunningly, when I loathe deceit and cunning, may 
find it easy to forgive a dead woman. 

Hetty sat with this strange document before her 
quite a Avhile. Why should this dead woman have' 
trusted so much to chance ? Then, in quick vindica- 
tion, she ran over the possible circumstances : Her 
brother she evidently stood in awe of. Her sister — 
my mother ” — Hetty almost sobbed the words out — 
“ no one seems ever to have turned to her for help.” 
Then, more comfortably : She had married and 

gone away to live before my cousin and his mother 
came here. But why should Archibald, to whom 
this hidden message had been so carefully transmit- 
ted from his uncle to old Lucy, from Lucy to his 
own hands, have been so careless of it Then she 
recalled how her mother heaped her swift, harsh in- 
sults upon him, driving him from his home. What 
more natural than that he should forget this poor, 
little, shabby book ? 

“ That was why,” she said, suddenly, “ he wrote 
back for hooks only. Doubtless he-expected this one 
to come to him, but would not draw attention to it 
by specifying it. 

Oh, my mother ! to think that these two men — 
your brother and your nephew — should find their 
worst enemy in you, the only woman of their line!” 

She fell asleep that night sobbing bitterly. If 


204 


A BTBAJVGi; PILGRIMAGE. 


only she could annihilate the long, dreary Sunday 
that must intervene between that exciting day and 
the Monday which should see her mother depart for 
Miss Spinnaker’s and herself left free to explore 
that receptacle of mysteries — the armoire in the 
attic ! 

The last thing her consciousness took in that night 
was the sound of those weary sighs and shuffling 
feet that had haunted her through all those dreary 
winter months. 

But the Sunday did wear away, and the Monday 
burst upon the ^^orld in a flood of glorious spring 
sunshine. 

Mrs. Ogden leaned out of the carriage-window to 
give Hetty some final directions : 

See to it that Mr. Maury and the boys have 
their dinner promptly at two, Hetty ; and stay out 
in the sunshine as much as you want to yourself. I 
may not get back before dark; the roads are as 
heavy as in midwinter.” 

She was gone. Hetty breathed freely. Before 
the carriage had rolled into the public road from the 
Dabney grounds, she was fitting the key into the 
lock of the armoire upstairs in the attic with a 
trembling hand. 

There were two prizes behind that door that she 
must secure this day — the tin box Parmelie Kose 
had said she must examine, and that package in 
the wallet. Both of them belonged to her Cousin 
Archibald. 

There was no difficulty in finding the leathern 
wallet. She dropped it into the pocket of her dress 


A STBAJ\rGB PILQRIMxiQE. 


205 


hastily, then with both hands she clasped the tin box, 
and was about to close the armoire door when she 
heard that stifled sigh once more coming from the 
near depths of the armoire as it had done that first 
time of her stolen visit. She shrieked out, in ter- 
rified protest : 

‘‘You told me to do it! Am I not doing your 
bidding. Uncle Kichard?” 

“ Miss Aggie 1 My sweet, sweet mistress 1” came 
back to her in stealthy, imploring tones. 

Hetty held her breath and leaned forward with 
startled eyes and ears attent. 

“ Let me go down the river, my sweet chile. ’Fore 
de lawd, Lucy won’ never open her lips ag’in ” 

With frantic haste Hetty tore down the dresses 
and cloaks that hung in a silken, velvety mass on the 
hooks of the old Avardrobe. A loose panel in the 
back of the armoire yielded readily to her pressure. 
She peered into a dark cuddy beyond, lighted only 
by the rays of sunshine that penetrated the shrunken 
shingle-roof. 

“ Who is there ?” she asked, imperatively. 

At the aperture, with her withered hands clasped 
imploringly, and her aged features twitching with 
nervous excitement, old Lucy appeared. 

The young girl stretched out her soft, white 
hands, and laying hold upon the tottering form, 
drew the old Avoman out into the Avarm, sunny attic. 


206 


A jSTF,Am^ FIIGFIMAGF, 


CHAPTEE XYIL 


A DAY OF FATE. 


HAT AEE you doing here?” Hetty asked, 



VV as soon as she could recover her breath for 
amazement. She had seated the old woman in an 
arm-chair which had been relegated to the attic 
when Mrs. Ogden had refurnished the grand draw- 
ing-room down-stairs. Lucy sat on the edge of it 
trembling from fright, and blinking her dazzled eyes 
in the full blaze of sunlight. She looked timidly 
back toward the dark aperture from which Hetty 
had drawn her, almost Vv^ithout any will of her own, 
and rubbed her withered hands together nervously. 

I ain’ doin’ nothin’, honey,” she said, apologetic- 
ally. 

I wastis a heap uv good time in thar, but I 
made sho’ yur was ]Miss Aggie. I didn’ know Miss 
Aggie ’lowed anybody but herseff to come up yhere-. 
I wouldn’ a-spoke ef I’d knowed it were you.” 

‘‘ She has not allowed me this time. I came with- 
out her knowing it.” 

Old Lucy made a restless movement. 

^‘Mebbe I better be goin’ back now, honey.” 

Going back where ?” 

‘Hn the cubby. Miss Aggie mout scold you, 
honey.” 

You are not going back in that hole any more.” 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 207 

The old woman looked at her eagerly. 

Did Miss Aggie say dat word 

“ Mother does not know anything about my being 
up here, I told you. She has gone out to see Miss 
Spinnaker, and will be gone all day. When did you 
get back?” 

“ Back from whar, honey ?” 

“ Back from the Creek Place.” 

“ I ain’t never ben at no Crick Place yit, honey.” 

Haven’t you been with your children this 
winter ?” 

“ Ho, honey. I ben pesterin’ Miss Aggie to lemnie 
go, but she say I ain’ never learn how t’ hoi’ my 
tongue yit.” 

“How long have you been in there?” Hetty 
- asked, pointing to the small room under the roof, 
the door to which had been cunningly concealed by 
the big armoire. 

“ Ever sence that night I gin you the book for 
Mars’ Archie. Mars’ Dick made a special p’int of 
yo’ cousin gittin’ that book, ’cause it was all lies ma 
lef’ him.” 

Hetty had turned very pale while the old woman 
was talking, and now dropped heavily on a roll of 
carpeting by the arm-chair she was sitting in. 

“ Y ou ain’t los’ that book, honey ?” Lucy clasped 
her withered hands in agitation. 

“Ho, no, no; the book is all right. ■ I was think- 
ing of you. I was thinking of the sighs and tlie 
restless footsteps that I thought belonged to the 
other world. Oh ! if I’d only had more sense !” 

“Did I pester you much, honey? I forgetted 


m 


A smANG^ rlLGRIMAaM, 


that yo’ room was ’neatli the cubby, an’ I was mouty 
res’less at times.” 

“ Pester me ! I was not thinking of myself. I 
was thinking of you. I might have let you out 
before.” 

I’se ben doin’ ve’y well, honey ; dat is to say, 
tollable well. Miss Aggie, she come ev’y night arter 
you all gone to bed, and fetch me mo’ vittles than I 
kin possibly ’vour. An’ she jus’ pile blankets and 
comfortables in thar for me t’ sleep under, w’en it 
wuz col’ ; but somehow I miss de sunshine moutily, 
an’ I miss my pipe mighty bad, honey, an’ then I 
ben wastin’ so much good time. Lucy never were a 
lazy nigger.” 

“ Why did my mother want to keep you there, 
Aunt Lucy 

The old woman glanced furtively toward the door 
of the attic. 

“You need not be afraid. The door is locked on 
the inside.” 

“But Miss Aggie says my mout’ too big. She 
done punish me ’nough ’bout talkin’.” 

“Well, then, you need not say another word. 
You shan’t get into any more trouble through me. 
I am going to tell yoio something. When I tell you 
the truth, shake your head this way.” Hetty gave 
a quick, affirmative nod. “ When I am stating an 
untruth, this way.” She shook her head solemnly 
in negation. 

“You is a sharp chil’, an’ no mistake,” said old 
Lucy, admiringly. “ Go on, honey.” 

“ To begin with,” said Hetty, “ I have been to see 


i btrAI^g:^ pilgrimage. 


Miss Parmelie Bose 1 I spent an hour with her on 
Saturday*” 

“ De lawd I Do Miss Aggie know dat 
You are not to speak,” said Hetty, impera- 
tively. 

‘‘ I am going to tell you what she told me. Her 
brother, Mr. John, stood behind a closet-door, 
where I could see him all the time. She thought I 
was mother, and talked to me abouf something she 
and my mother did when they were two wild school- 
girls. I hope I will find out that her crazy words 
meant less than I beheve they did.” 

Lucy shook her head mournfully. 

“ She told me that before my Grandmother Dab- 
ney died, my Uncle Bichard fell in love with a sew- 
ing-girl who used to come here by the week to sew 
for my grandma. Was that true?” 

Old Lucy shook her head afiirmatively, then burst 
out explosively : 

‘‘But she war’n no common sempstriss, honey. 
Her pa was a officer in the army, and when he die 
he lef her an’ her ma that bad off that she had to 
turn in and help some, and ol’ Miss giv’ her some 
work to do. She was a beauty, too. Miss Bella 
were.” 

“ Miss Bose did not tell me so, but I think she 
was in love with my Uncle Bichard herself.” 

Lucy gave an affirmative nod. 

“Miss Bose was rich, and my grandmother and 
mother wanted Uncle Dick to marry her.” 

“ You’s right, honey ; but go on. I am gwine tell 
you nothin’. You’s tellin’ me de truth, though.” 


^16 A STRANGE PILGRiMAOK 

When my grandmother found out what was go- 
ing on she turned the pretty sewing-girl off, and my 
Uncle Kiehard went into town where she lived with 
her mother and married her there, but did not dare 
bring here. Grandmother died sooii after this, and 
then my Uncle Dick began to fix up to bring his 
bride home. He did not like to do it too soon after 
grandma’s death, but every day he would bring 
home something pretty and put it in the room that 
was going to be hers. 

“ My mother and Miss Eose were determined to 
break off what they thought was only a foolish 
love affair. They did not know he was really mar- 
ried to the pretty sewing-girl. The first time 
he went to see her after my grandmother’s funeral 
he saw a strange young man jumping off her back 
gallery and getting into the street by a lane. He 
asked her who it was, and she said no one but her- 
self had been inside her yard for a week. 

She looked red, and confused, and miserable, for 
my mother had just been there saying cruel and in- 
sulting things to her, but had left when she saw my 
uncle coming in at the gate. She would not tell 
him his sister had been there, saying those awful 
things to her, and she could not tell him that the 
strange young man was Miss Parmelie Eose herself, 
who had managed that he should only see her riding- 
coat and high hat as he opened the front gate, for she 
did not know it. That was the plan my mother 
and her friend had concocted between them to make 
my uncle give up his poor sweetheart. 

It was a wicked and successful plan ; but, thank 


A STRAmE PILGBIMAOB. 211 

God, my mother did not know how wicked at that 
time. 

They had an awful quarrel — my uncle and his 
wife. She denied over and over a^ain that he had 
seen anyone going out of her house by a side-way. 
He believed she was telling him a falsehood. When 
he started to leave her she just put a box in his 
hands and told him it held everything of value he 
had ever given her. She had never dared wear his 
jewels openly, and she would not be supported by him 
until he acknowledged her before the world as 
his wife. All his money and jewels were in that box. 

“ He told her that tho box should never be unlocked 
until she came to him with proofs of her innocence, 
and then she should take her place before all the 
world as his wife. He told her to send him the key 
when she was ready with the proof.” 

“ It ain’t right, honey ! it ain’t right !” said old 
Lucy, once more breaking her pact of silence, to 
pour such tales into a child’s ears. Miss Rose ought 
to be ’shamed of herself.” 

“Child?” said Hetty, bitterly. “I feel as if I 
were a thousand years old. But don’t interrupt ; I 
want to teU you all that I learned from mad Par- 
melie Rose last Saturday before I leave you.” 

“ Leave me, honey ?” 

“ Y es. I am going to leave you only until it is 
dark — I am going to put you back into your prison- 
house until it grows dark ; then I am going to set 
you on the road with some money in your purse. 
But don’t interrupt again — I want you to see if I’ve 
got it all right, for after you are gone I am going to 


212 


A STBAJVGJ^ PILGRIMAGE. 


tell m j mother about Parmelie and about my letting 
you out.” 

Go on, honey, go on ! It do look as if de Lord 
was straightenin’ things out !” 

‘^My Uncle Dick was hot-tempered and proud. 
His wife was proud and insulted. Neither would 
give way. He locked up the house and went to 
Europe for a year. When he came back, the sewing- 
girl and her mother had moved out of the neigh- 
borhood.” 

And that’s the Lord’s truth,” said Lucy, swaying 
to and fro in her chair. “ Blessed be the Lord, that 
maketh the light to shine in the dark places.” 

‘AVhen my uncle came back my mother tried 
harder and harder to make him marry Miss Parme- 
lie Pose, but he would not have anything to do with 
her ; and then, after a little, people began to say Miss 
Kose was queer ; and she got queerer and queerer, 
until her good, patient brother had to lock her up.” 

‘‘ Did Miss Pose tell you all that herself, honey ?” 
said Lucy, with a perplexed look on her withered 
face. 

^‘No. I am making up the story out of the 
snatchy way she told mother (you know she thought 
I was mother) about what came after. She accused 
mother of having gotten her into trouble and then 
deserting her. She says she came to mother Avhile 
Uncle Dick Avas in Europe and told her hoAV that 
poor young Avoman had sent for her, just before he 
Avent aAvay, and gave her the key to the box and 
asked her to take it to Uncle Pichard Avith her oAvn 
hands, and tell him that there must be some awful 


A STHAJVG^ PILORIMAGE. 


213 


mistake, for she had been a true, loving wife to him, 
and only wanted to be forgiven for the angry words 
she had spoken that day. 

“But mother vowed that that woman should 
never be at the head of this house, and she had al- 
w'ays managed Miss Bose, so she continued to man- 
age her ; and then when Uncle Dick’s wife, suppos- 
ing that he had got the key but refused to be recon- 
ciled, went away before he came back, there was no 
reason to give him the key and the message. Uo 
one knew where the sewing-girl had gone to. 

“So then mother married and went away, and 
poor, maUBarinelie was .locked up, and my Uncle 
Bichard never knew that his wife had sent him that 
loving message and the key by her hand.” 

“You’s tol’ me more than I knowed myself, 
honey — heaps more !” 

“ And then,” said Hetty, thoughtfully, “ poor Miss 
Bose herself seemed to get confused and wild, and 
insisted upon it that I (thinking, you know, all the 
while that I was mother) ought to examine the box. 
She thinks that perhaps there may be something 
in there to prove that the woman who gave her 
that key and begged her to give it to my Uncle 
Dick was not really his wife.” 

“ She cyan’t prove that, honey — no ma’am. They 
was wedded man and wife, and folks hadn’t ought to 
put them ’sunder.” 

“ But the strangest part of it all is, that poor Miss 
Bose says she got a letter two or three years after 
that, telling her that my Uncle Dick’s wife had a 
little son two years old, and that she was going to 


214 


A 6TBAJ\^GI^ PILGRIMAGE. 


send him to a half-sister of my uncle’s, "who lived in. 
Vermont, and that she wanted to know, for her 
son’s sake, if my Uncle Dick still believed that 
falsehood of her. 

‘‘You see, all this time my uncle’s wife thought 
Miss Rose was her true friend ; and she gave me that 
letter on Saturday, Aunt Lucy. My Uncle Dick’s 
wife wrote it about her little boy.” 

“AVhat became of him, honey? For wherever 
he may be, that boy is Mars’ Dick Dabney’s own 
son and heir. Miss Arkabella Murray warn’ capa- 
ble — no, honey, she warn’ capable — of tellin’ no lie 
’bout such a solemn matter. Miss Bella was true grit, 
I tell you.” 

Miss Arkabella Murray ?” 

^‘That was the maiden name Mars’ Dick’s 
wife, honey.” 

Hetty repeated the name over softly to herself. 
The coincidence of its similarity to her cousin’s, 
name seemed never to have struck old Lucy. 

“ What became of him, honey ?” she asked 
again. 

That I cannot tell you. I have not read the letter 
Miss Rose gave me. It was sealed and meant for 
mother. I have been trying to muster the courage 
to give it to her ; but first I mean to know all that 
this box can tell me.” 

She stooped and picked up the heavy tin box, 
then put it down, and looked at old Lucy depreca- 
tingly. 

“ I hate to send you back in there. Aunt Lucy, 
even for an hour or two; but I must get some 


■A STMAmM PlLontMAGE. 215 

’money and provisions ready for you, and then I am 
^oing to liberate you for good.” 

The old ■woman rose with alacrity. 

‘‘ Don’t worry ’bout me, honey. I kin do ve’y 
well for a little while longer. Miss Aggie ain’ lef 
me want for nothin’, on’y she say she goin’ put me 
whar my tongue can’t wag ; and arter all. Miss Eose 
was the one to tell it all 1” 

Hetty rearranged the armoire just as she had 
found it, sending little apologetic speeches through 
the closed panel with every garment she hung upon 
the hooks, and old Lucy’s grateful responses came 
to her more and more thickly muffled from her 
room. 

The chatter of the boys at the dinner-table, over 
which, in her mother’s absence, she was compelled 
to preside, almost drove her wild that day. 

Hugh Maury saw, pitied, and misjudged the agita- 
tion she could not conceal. 

“ I was a brute,” he said to himself, “ to give her 
that letter to read ; but how could I imagine she was 
in love with the fellow ?” 

Hight once more dropped its somber mantle over 
the earth. Mrs. Ogden had not yet returned. The 
boys, tired with a long afternoon of foot-ball, were 
fretting for her return. The lighted lamps were 
being placed upon the tea-table and upon the hall- 
table. Hetty, with a light shawl wrapped about her, 
was walking up and down in the shadowy gloom of 
the front gallery, nervously formulating the confes- 
sion which must be made on her mother’s return, 
when a shrill laugh of triumph smote upon the air. 


216 A PILGRIMAGE. 

She faced in the direction of the sound with a 
startled cry! 

There, in the hand of light cast upon the lawn 
from the lamp just placed upon the hall-table, stood 
mad Parmelie Eose, dancing gleefully and clapping 
her hands in triumph ! 

Hetty had scarcely grasped the fact of this un- 
canny presence before other voices, pitched in a key 
of shrill alarm, spread the blood-curdling cry of fire I 
Lurid tongues of fiame were afieady leaping high 
above the doomed roof-tree of the old Dabney 
mansion 1 

An hour later, Hugh Maury leaned panting and 
exhausted against the trunk of a tree on the flame- 
illumined lawn, wiping the soot-blackened perspira- 
tion from his forehead. 

He had accomplished the work of ten men, and 
the lawn was strewn with household effects which 
the quarter people, working zealously under his com- 
mand, had rescued from the blazing building. 

Hetty and the boys were huddled in one terrified 
group just where he had placed them in the first 
place, imperatively forbidding them to move. 

There was no help for the old homestead I Ho 
fire-engines, no trained hosemen! Nothing for it 
but to stand there and see the grand old pile de- 
voured by the hungry flames. Above the roaring of 
the flames and the crash of the falling timbers and 
the excited voices of the crowd came the swift roll 
of wheels, presently, and the furious trampling of 
horses, lashed to their utmost speed. A second 
more and he felt his arm gripped fiercely, while Mrs. 


A STBAJSraB PILORIMAOE. 


217 


Ogden, with her mouth almost pressed against his 
ear, said hoarsely ; 

There is a woman perishing in those flames! 
An old and feeble woman! There, behind that 
gable end. The flames have not reached her.” 

He tore himself loose from her grasp and bounded 
toward the burning building, seizing an ax from the 
hand of a negro as he ran. With the leap of a 
chamois he sprang up the front steps and disappeared 
within the main hall, which had not yet caught. 

It was all done so quickly that Hetty, rushing 
frantically forward, had no chance to bring him back. 
She turned on her mother with horror in her face, 
crying shrilly : 

“ You have sent him to his death ! To his death, 
do you hear, mother ! Why did you do it ? Oh ! 
call him back, call him back. There is no one there. 
Ho one, I tell you ; call him back !” turning flercely 
on the gaping negroes about her ; then — close in her 
mother’s ear — “ She is gone ! Your prisoner is free. 
I released her with my own hands.” 

Thank God!” 

Mrs. Ogden’s tall form swayed ; she flung her arms 
out spasmodically and fell in a limp, helpless heap at 
her daughter’s feet. They crowded about her, 
daughter, sons and servants, frightened and power- 
less. Horsemen came galloping in. The flames had 
summoned the neighbors. Doctor Yernon pushed 
his way through the group that had formed about 
the prostrate, woman. 

“ Only a faint,” some one said, encouragingly, 
putting a strong arm about Hetty’s trembling form, 


218 


A PILGRIMAGE. 


“Take the poor child away/’ Doctor Yernon had 
whispered in his oar, “ It is death — her heart ! I 
knew she would go this waj.” 

There was a mighty crash of timbers ! a dense 
volume of black smoke;! The face of the earth 
seemed blotted out of existence. There was one 
horrified cry on every lip 1 Where was Hugh 
Maury f’ 

Y^here was the hero who had taken his life in his 
hands and flung it from him ,as a thing of no worth I 
hip one could tell. 


219 


4 STBANOE PILORIMAQE. 


CHAPTEE XYIII. 

A PILGEiai ONCE MORE. 

S PPHSTG’s longest-lived wild flowers had drooped 
and faded from off the face of the earth ! The 
June roses had dropped from their stems! The 
heat of midsummer was scorching the grass and the 
foliage of the forest trees into a russet hue, when 
one of the large passenger pa^jkets that ply the 
Mississippi Eiver between Yicksburg and ITew 
Orleans landed at Hawkspoint to put ashore a 
traveling party which attracted unusual attention 
from the loungers about the store galleries, whose 
invariable custom it was to swarm about the big 
;stage-plank as soon as it swung shoreward. 

The long, dull days were upon that rural com- 
munity — days in which there was little to be done 
beside waiting for the crops to mature in the broad 
cotton-fields, upon whose success or failure Hawks- 
point depended for its own share of weal or woe. 

The landing of any stranger at this sleepy little 
burg was matter of curious interest at all times, 
but this small traveling party would have excited 
curiosity and sympathetic interest at any point by 
reason of the peculiarly helpless units it was com- 
posed of. 

The one man of the party was apparently totally 


^20 


A STUANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


blind and walked by the aid of two stout crutches. 
He was youthful-looking, but pale and emaciated in 
the extreme. One of the two females who com- 
posed the rest of the party was a slight young girl, 
with a refined bearing, and a pale, gentle face lighted 
up by a pair of sweet, serious eyes, that looked 
gravely out from beneath a black bonnet, heavily 
bordered with a long crape veil. The third mem- 
ber of this striking group was an old black woman, 
who hovered in a restlessly protecting way about 
her two companions. 

Husband and wife,” said one Hawkspoint loafer 
to another, as the three walked quietly past the 
group of loungers, and making their way to the 
nearest store gallery, set on foot inquiries about a 
conveyance to take them back into the country. 

Brother and sister,” said another man. “ Guess 
they are traveling, with their old mammy, for that 
fellow’s health. He looks pretty well used up. Hot 
Springs, in Arkansas, is where he wants to go. 
Wonder who they are consigned to?” 

It was evident no one was expecting them. There 
was no carriage from any of the outlying wealthy 
plantations to meet them. Ho inquiry, even, as to 
their probable arrival had been heard from any 
source. 

“ I will do the talking,” the young woman was 
heard to say, as between them all they got the man, 
who handled his crutches as if they were still a nov- 
elty to him, comfortably established in an arm-chair 
on a shady corner of the gallery, where the old 
woman stood guard over him and the satchels while 


A STJiAmB PlLGRIMAGJ^. 

the young one penetrated to the clerk’s desk within 
to arrange for a conveyance. 

‘‘ Doctor Bemish’s is where you want to go to, 
Miss f ’ the clerk said, inquiringly, closing his big 
ledger with alacrity for the superior occupation of 
talking to a very handsome young woman, who an- 
swered him in a voice of unusual sweetness : 

“Yes,” she told him. “Doctor Bemish’s place was 
their point of destination.” 

“ I suppose you know the old gentleman is very 
m— ill abed?” 

“ ]^o ; had not heard it.” 

“ If it is a* doctor you were wanting for — your 
brother — or, a — your husband ” 

“ My friend,” she corrected him, in an unmoved 
manner. 

“Friend? Yes, Miss, beg pardon. I was about 
to say, we have sort of laid Doctor Bemish on the 
shelf here. Everybody sends for Doctor Murray 
that wants a doctor. He’s just about at the top of 
the local ladder — lives just around the corner here.” 

The young woman arranged her crape veil with a 
nervous twitch before answering, icily : 

“ I was inquiring if I could hire a wagon of any 
sort to take my party out to Doctor Bemish’s place. 
Can you, or can you not, help me in this matter ?” 

“Well, Miss, we’ve got most everything else you 
could ask for in this shop but a vehicle. But there 
never was a more accommodating fellow on earth 
than Doctor Murray. He’s got a big buggy that 
will hold ” 

But he was addressing himself to space. The 


2^^ A smAMJBi piiaBiMAeK 

young lady had turned from him abruptly and was 
prosecuting her inquiries of an old negro man, who 
had just then stepped into the store with a huge 
driver’s whip in his hand. 

The old man stood perplexedly before her, twirl- 
ing his rimless hat between his hard hands. 

‘^You seem mouty insistent. Missy. I ain’ got 
a thing here but the spring-wagon. I come in fur 
a sack of oats. It’s clean — the wagon, I mean — an’ 
my folks goes to meet in’ in it uv Sunda3^s, settin’ on 
cheers ; but w’ite folks couldn’t travdl that way, you 
know.” 

“Ho ; I don’t know it. I could and will if Mr. — 
if my friend caYstand it. Wait here for me.” 

She walked away rapidly to where she had left 
the bhnd man and the old negress. 

“ I have found a wagon,” she said, “ in which we 
can go to Doctor Bemish’s place, if we are able to 
sit on chairs. Aunt Lucy and I can do it, but how 
about you, Mr. Maury ?” 

Hugh was silent, evidently weighing the chances 
of his being able to retain his position in a jolting 
wagon with his useless hmbs deprived of the 
crutches. j 

“ What a clod I am become,” he said, finalty, in a 
bitter voice. 

“ The clerk in there says that Doctor Bemish is 
very ill,” Hetty said, anxiously, in reply. 

“ Then we will go in the wagon if I have to lie 
down in the bottom. Perhaps I am already too 
late. Dear child, what a burden I am on you.” 

“ Oh, no ! Don’t say that ! Surely, God, who 


A STEANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


223 


has permitted you to live through such horrible suf^ 
ferings, will let you complete your strange pilgrim- 
age with a heart at peace. Dear, dear friend ! have 
you not already made atonement 

She leaned over the back of his chair, rearrang- 
ing the green shade that was bound about his brow, 
while she softly poured this comfort into his ears ; 
then she turned back to the waiting teamster and 
completed her arrangements for the transferring of 
her party, with all. their baggage, to the wagon, 
in which the chairs had already been placed. 

It was a torturingly slow mode of progression, 
but better than remaining on the store gallery wait- 
ing for any chance conveyance, with the possible al- 
ternative of having to beg a night’s shelter from 
some one of the villagers. 

Hugh Maury lay upon a pile of traveling-shawls 
and rugs in the wagon-bed. Hetty and old Lucy 
swayed helplessly to and fro with every motion of 
the springless wagon over the roads, which were 
heavy with the summer showers and rough with 
deep-cut wagon-ruts. 

Their driver was cautiously trying to circumvent 
an unusually deep mud-hole, in an especially narrow 
point of the road, when a buggy, drawn by a pair of 
glossy bays, dashed suddenly into view around a 
bend of the road in front of them. 

The nesrro driver drew rein and came to a halt. 
A gentleman sitting by him, who up to that time 
had been completely absorbed in an open pamphlet 
before him, looked up and regarded the party in the 
wagon with bright, curious eyes, As the wagon cam^ 


224 


A STJiAJVai^ PILGRIMAGE. 


abreast of his handsome turnout he lifted his hat in 
recognition of a lady’s presence, and held it court- 
eously aloft until another slow revolution of the 
wheels carried them beyond him. 

His driver brought the silken lash of his buggy- 
whip lightly down upon the bays’ flanks. They got 
under way with a spirited bound that made the 
polished buggy-wheels spin around rapidly. Old 
Lucy turned her head to look after the dashing team 
with a look of perplexity on her face. 

‘Hioney,” she said, laying her hand softly on 
Hetty’s arm, “ who does that look lak 

Hetty was sitting rigidly erect, with a dravm, 
hard look about her sweet mouth new to the old 
woman’s experience. She was pale to the very lips. 
Their driver officiously answered Lucy’s inquiry : 

That were Doctor Murrav. He jus’ ’bout lays 
over all de doctors that ever is ben here. I reckon 
he ben out to Mars’ Leonard Glen’s. Folks says 
him and Miss Thersie — she’s Mars’ Glen’s sister — is 
mighty fond uv each other. But he don’t live there 
now.” 

Hold your gab, my friend, and attend to your 
mules, will you ?” came roughly from Hugh Maury, 
just then ; we hired your wagon and not your 
tongue.” 

The driver subsided into unresentful silence. 
I^one of the little party cared to talk. They, or at 
least two of them, had plenty of food for serious re- 
flection. 

Hetty was thinking of that awfully sudden death 
of her mother’s ; of the quiet putting away of the 


A STRAUB PILORIMAOB. 225 

last of the Dabney’s in the family burying-groiind ; 
of the rage and grief of the boys when they found 
they were to be immured in a boarding-school ; of 
that last visit to John Rose’s, who had come to her 
to tell her that mad Parmelie’s incendiary freak had 
compelled him to put her into an 'asjdum. It had 
all been crowded into a few short months. And 
here she was, come to put into her cousin’s hands 
the wallet and the tin-box which were to tell him so 
much of importance. He looked happy and prosper- 
ous. She had no idea that the things she had taken 
so much pains to bring to him would add one iota to 
his happiness. 

‘‘ She IS his happiness,” she said. I can bring him 
nothing. I can take from him nothing.” 

Plugh Maury was thinking of the near end to his 
strange pilgrimage ; of his miraculous escape from 
death from those falling timbers ; of how he had 
come out of that fiery furnace so maimed and help- 
less that he knew all hope of finding George Bemish 
must be given up forever ; of how he had told Hetty 
that he had but one wfish left on earth, and that was 
to get back to Doctor Bemish and bare his whole 
soul to the father whom he had wronged equally 
with the son; of how she had told him that she was 
resolved to see her cousin once more, and put him 
again in his rightful place as head of the Dabney 
family ; of how they had arranged to take this long 
journey together — she to be eyes for him, he to guide 
her with his experience, old Lucy to care for them 
both. 

Old Lucy had but one subject of reflection, but 




226 


A STRANOE PILGRIMAOE. 


that one filled her simple soul and mind through 
every waking moment. It was of God’s miraculous 
goodness in sending Hetty to open her prison-door 
only one little hour before mad Parmelie Kose had 
laid the torch in the wing-room that consigned the 
Dabney house to ruins. 

Y es, there was plenty to think of, and the few 
miles that lay between Hawkspoint and the Bemish 
Place were accomplished with no great amount of 
discomfort nor any needless delay. 

“ Here we is,” said the teamster, cheerfully, ignor- 
ing the fact that he had been snubbed. And I 
’low the old doctor gwine be mightily ’stonish’ when 
he find a purty young lady come to see him.” 

He helped the crippled man tenderly from the 
wagon and put him carefully on his crutches, then 
stood looking wonderingly after the strange trio 
that was about to invade the doctor’s privacy. 

The travelers met an unexpected repulse on the 
threshold of the doctor’s house. The large front 
door stood hospitably wide open. On one side of 
the long main hall stood a cane settee, which at that 
moment was being utilized as a lounge. A huge 
recumbent figure occupied its entire length — more, 
in fact, as a shock of red hair protruded over the 
arm of the settee nearest the front door, and a pair 
of heavy shoes, badly in need of polishing, were 
poised conspicuously over the other arm. 

Hetty knocked timidly on the open door. There 
was something in the deadly stillness of the house 
that intimidated her. 

The man on the lounge slowly uncoiled himself, 


A STRAmE PILGRIMAOE. 


and bringing his feet cautiously together on the 
resonant oil-clothed floor, stared at the intruders 
stupidly for a full second. Then he got up and 
came toward them, smoothing his shaggy red hair 
down with both hands. 

I reckon I’d just about dropped off,” he said, and 
didn’t hear you come in. The old man is too sick to 
prescribe for folks to-day. Don’t know as he ever 
will prescribe again.” 

But we are not sick people, and we want to see 
him on a matter that concerns himself,” said Hetty, 
who was the appointed spokesman for the party. 

“ It can’t be did. Miss. Doctor Bemish is a very 
sick man. He ought to have a doctor long before 
this, but he’s as obstinate as a team uv mules. He 
went off into a sort of faint about daybreak, and 
ain’t spoken since. I’ve sent for Murray. Looking 
for him every minute.” ^ 

While this short colloquy had been going on, 
Hugh Maury had stood with his head leaning for- 
ward, eagerly listening with that intentness which is 
so pathetic in the newly-blinded. How he leaned 
forward and laid one of his long, thin fingers on the 
man’s coat-sleeve. 

Isn’t this Ben McBride ?” he asked, eagerly. 

“ That’s my name, sir.” 

“ Doctor Bemish’s overseer ?” 

‘‘That’s my occupation, sir.” 

“ And you don’t know me ?” 

The shaggy man looked him carefully over from 
head to foot, shook his head, and answered, bluntly : 
“ you’ve got the advantage of me, sir.” 


228 ^ SmANGE PILGRIMAGE. 

“ Isn’t there even a suggestion of Hugh Maury in 
this battered hulk of a body f ’ the blind man cried, 
spreading his poor, thin hands out piteously. 

The overseer recoiled several steps and stared at 
him incredulously. 

“ Hugh Maury ! Good God, man, what have you 
been doing to yourself ?” 

Spending himself for others !” said Hetty, dash- 
ing from her eyes the tears that Hugh’s piteous ap- 
peal had brought into . them. 

The shaggy man led the party into the drawing- 
room, almost supporting Hugh in his arms. 

‘‘ You were always my good friend, Ben,”, said 
Hugh, in a calmer voice; “you must stand by me 
now. See if Doctor Bemish can possibly be inter- 
viewed. For his own sake I ask it.” 

“ If he is at himself he will see you, I know. It 
was only yesterday that tlie poor old man was 
moaning, in his sleep : ‘ If only I knew how to find 

Maury !’ I tried to get out of him what he wanted 
of you ; for, you knoAV, I thought perhaps — remem- 
bering what good friends you and George used to 
be (poor George) — he might want to leave the prop- 
erty to you, fixed so that George (if he ever turned 
up) might get it, you know. Poor old man ; it was 
that scrape of George’s that just wore him plumb 
out. You think he’s ever got so much as a line 
from the scamp 

Hugh put out his hands with a gesture of pain. 

“ Go,” he said, hoarsely, “and see if he will let me 
come in to him.” 

The overseer started across the hall to do his bid- 


A STBANGE PILGJRLVAGE. 


229 


ding, st02:)p8d, glanced toward the front gate, and 
retraced his steps toward the parlor. 

“ I see Murray just gettin’ out of his bugg}^ at the 
front gate. I think it would be safest to let him 
examine the old man first. Pll come for you the 
minute there is a chance.” 

He closed the door to the drawing-room and with- 
drew. Sitting there, in the darkened room, Hetty 
could hear her cousin come briskly up the walk, ex- 
change a few w'ords with the overseer, then their 
voices died away, and the tired travelers were left to 
their own disturbing conjectures. 


m 


A STMAJSfGE PILOmMAGR 


CHAPTEK XIX. 

LIBERATED. 

I T SEEMED to Hetty, sitting there, quivering 
with nervousness in every limb; anxious, and 
yet dreading the coming of the moment when she 
should stand face to face once more with the cousin 
upon whom she had been lavishing the unsought de- 
votion of her fresh young heart ever since the mo- 
ment of their first meeting — as if an age passed be- 
fore the parlor-door once more opened to admit the 
tall form of the overseer. 

He came in as softly as such a huge animal possi- 
bly could come, and was followed by a small black 
girl, who blinked at the unexpected guests in a half- 
awake fashion over the chimney of a kerosene lamp 
which had evidently been smearily-brightened for 
the occasion. The overseer seated himself by Hugh. 
He looked very grave. 

I ain’t so certain, my boy, but what you’ ve come 
too late, after all. Murray looks mighty grave, and 
says he can’t think of but one thing that would do 
the old man any good, and that’s to see George 
brought home free from suspicion. How, you know, 
that’s manifestly impossible,” he said, with empha- 
sis ; for even if folks knowed where George Be- 
rn ish was to be got at, he’d be in danger of arrest 
the minute he showed his face here,” 


A STEAjSrGE PILGRIMAGE. 


231 


“ Nothing is impossible said Hugh, impatiently. 
“ Go tell your Doctor Murray that if I cannot see 
Doctor Bemish I must see him at once — at once !’’ he 
l epeated, iihperatively. 

“You sound more like the old Hugh than you 
looks,” said McBride, with a short laugh. “ Doctor 
Murray said he’d come in presently ; but I thought 
maybe the young lady might like to be showed to a 
bedroom at once, if she’s come very far to-day.” 

“ The young lady,” said Hugh, taking time at last 
to think of patient Hetty’s separate mission, “is 
cousin of Doctor Murray’s, who has come on here 
to see him about family matters of importance.” 

“ That, indeed !” said Mr. McBride, with a rising 
inflection. “ All the same. Miss — Miss ” 

“ Ogden is my name,” Hetty said, curtly. 

“ Thank you. Miss. All the same. Miss Ogden, if 
you’d ruther be relieved of your hat and things, 
that door, there, will take you into the spare bed- 
room, where the doctor’s lady visitors always sleeps. 
There ain’t been any of them here lately, but I tell 
you this old house used to know something about 
the light fantastic-toe ; didn’t it, Hugh ? Here, you 
Demps, show the young lady to the spare room.” 

The door opened once more, at that moment, and 
Archibald Murray peered into the dimly-lighted 
parlor to ask : 

“ Is the gentleman who wished to see Doctor Be- 
mish in here, Mr. McBride ?” 

“ Cousin Archie ! Cousin Archie I don’t you know 
me at all ?” was the startling response to this, as 
from out the gloom of the parlor a girlish figure had 


^32 A PILGRIMAGR 

sprung toward him, two slim, white hands had 
clasped his, and by the light of the swinging hall- 
lamp the doctor could see a sweet young face quiv- 
ering with pain in its every line. He drew her out 
into the bright light of the big hall, stared into 
her face confusedly for a second, then asked, in a 
voice of mixed amazement and incredulity : 

“Is it Hetty — my little cousin, Hetty Ogden? 
And did I pass you in a wagon to-day ?” 

“ Yes, yes, yes ; but take me somewhere where I 
<can talk to you. Hot here, standing in this great, 
cold hall.’’ 

She shivered and clung to him nervously. 

“ But what does this mean ?” Archie asked, laying 
his hand upon her long black veil, “ and what are 
you doing here, my child ?” 

“You are sorry to see me ! I can see it in your 
face.” 

The tears were in her eyes. 

He drew her toward him impulsively and kissed 
her wet eyelids, smiling all the while. 

“Always in tears, little cousin? Ho, I am not 
sorry to see you. Just at present I believe I am so 
bewildered, you see, that perhaps I have not said the 
conventional things. You seemed to have material- 
ized so suddenly, you know.” 

“ I hate conventional things — hate them,” said the 
girl, stamping her foot passionately. “ I’ve got so 
much to tell you. I could not write it ; I could not 
send it^ even by him,” pointing toward the parlor- 
door. “ There were things I had to bring to you 
myself, things I had to tell you myself ; I have not 


A STRAmE PILGRIMAGE. 


233 


come here to give yon tronbie, Cousin Archie, nor 

tg say anything that would — would ” She had 

been overwrought, poor child! Her nerves gave 
way suddenly, and with a broken and unintelligible 
termination to her sentence she burst into hysterical 
sobbing. 

“ Poor child, poor little Hetty, you need rest and 
sleep,” Archibald said kindly. If what you have 
to tell me concerns my own fortunes exclusively, it 
must wait. I shall not let you say another word 
until you are thoroughly rested.” 

Mr. McBride said I might go in there,” Hetty 
sobbed hysterically, pointing toward a door at the 
farther end of the hall. 

Archie led her toward it. It was a spacious bed- 
room all ready for her occupancy. 

“How we must find you an attendant — a lady’s 
maid,” he said, himself fumbling awkwardly with 
the black bonnet-ribbons under her chin. 

“ I have one,” said Hett}^, smiling at him through 
her tears, “ but she is in a heap on the parlor floor, 
sound asleep. Aunt Lucy is Avith me.” 

“ Old Lucy, my uncle’s housekeeper, my old 
friend 1” 

“Yes. She is devoted to you yet. You don’t 
deserve it ” 

“ And }wr mother let you come to ” 

“ Mother is dead ! The old place is yours once 
more. Cousin Archie, and I ” 

xirchie placed a finger over her lips : “Hot one 
word more ! Y ou must sleep, my child ; my OAvn 
affairs can and must wait. There are far graver m at- 


m 


A STItAmE PILGRIMAOE. 


ters for immediate concern on hand under this roof. 
Perhaps an old man’s life may hang in the balance. 
Now good-night. I will see that you have some tea 
brought to you, and in the morning, when you are 
strong and bright, we will have a long talk over 
family matters. Good-night, dear little cousin !” 

He drew her toward him and kissed her good- 
night. She stood where he had left her, just as she 
had stood once before, blushing and paling from the 
sweet intoxication of his kisses. But the two years 
that had passed over her head since he had kissed 
her first under the oaks at home had brought to her 
some of those subtile instincts that the years bring 
only too soon to women who feel and love the most. 

“ I am only his ‘ little cousin !’ His kisses mean 
nothing! He would hold her longer, and his lips 
would part from hers reluctantly. Ah, well, I knew 
it all before I came 1 Perhaps he will not think of 
me only as a child to be petted and put early to bed 
when I have told him everything. He was so anx- 
ious to dispose of me to-night 1” 

Yes, he had been very anxious to dispose of her. 
As he had said, the information she had come so far 
to communicate could wait for the morrow. Just 
then there was graver and weightier matter on 
hand. 

The old man whom he had so cruelly misjudged, 
the father of the man whom Theresa Glen loved, 
was lying prostrate ! Hovering between life and 
death ! There was only one hope for him. George 
Bemish must be brought to his bedside. Who 
would dare take the responsibility of bringing the 


A SfRANOE PILGRIMAGE. 


m 


hermit of the island back to his father’s house? 
Perhaps this cripple, whom McBride represented as 
George Bemish’s best friend in the days gone by, 
could aid him at this critical juncture. If he could 
not, no one could. He found Hugh Maury alone. 
The overseer had just disappeared, steering the only 
half-aroused Aunt Lucy toward the spare bed- 
chamber. Doctor Murray seated himself on the 
sofa by the blind man and entered into conversa- 
tion with him abruptly : 

Pardon me,” he said, if I say to you at once 
that unless you are prepared to relieve Doctor 
Bemish on the score of that unhappy affair of his 
son’s it will be useless for you to see him.” 

“ That is what I am here for,” said Hugh, with an 
audible catch in his voice. “ Did McBride give you 
my name ?” 

He did not. He simply said an old friend of the 
family.” 

“ He should have said an old enemy of the family. 
My name is Maury — Hugh Maury.” 

“ Hugh — Maury ! Great heavens I Can it be pos- 
sible ? Why, I had heard ” 

That Maury was a dashing, handsome dog.” 

Huofh took the words out of his mouth and went 
on, with bitter vehemence : “ That he had success 
with women; that his heart was as light as a 
troubadour’s, and that the loveliest woman in all the 
country-side had promised to be his wife.” 

“ Yes, I had heard all that — and more.” 

But that was before he had taken the life of a 
miscreant in hot blood, because that miscreant had 


S36 A srnAm^ PilorimagK 

spoken insulting words of the woman he loved, 
Hugh resumed, fiercely. “ That was before he had 
permitted his friend to bear the odium of suspicion 
for awhile, believing that his friend, a man of 
means and influence and innocence, could readily 
escape the fangs of the law. That was before he 
started out on his weary pilgrimage to find that 
friend and bring him home in triumph to the be- 
reaved old man who lies in yonder ; that was before, 
in the flames of a burning house, Hemesis overtook 
him, and left him the maimed and battered thing 
you see.” 

Good God ! Surely you have atoned for your 
rash deed, if physical suffering can atone for moral 
wrong-doing. From my soul I feel for you.” 

Hot yet — I have not atoned yet. The atone- 
ment will not be complete until I proclaim to all 
whom it may concern that I, and not George Bemish, 
took the life of Adrien Miclielet that day. That 
was what I came back here for ; and I had. meant 
to tell the old man that although I could not find 
his son, I could clear the name of Bemish from the 
stain of blood-guiltiness. That is what has crushed 
him. I know the old man. He was proud of his 
name and of his son. I meant him to have stood 
by my side while I made my public proclamation to 
the authorities, and gave up this fragment of a body 
for them to do as they would by it. Let justice 
have its way.” 

‘‘ Have no fears for yourself. Leave that to me. 
But you may still bring George Bemish home in 
triumph to his father 1” 


A STRANGE 'PILGRIMAGE. 237 

^‘ What ? MoBride tells me lie lias never been 
Seen or heard of since that night he broke jail.” 

I can take you to him.” 

“ You td^XiQ me to George Bemish?” 

ayes—//” 

‘^Wiien?” 

‘‘To-night — within an hour — now, if you say so.” 

“Now — now, at once! Oh, God ! I thank Thee 
for directing these last steps of my strange pilgrim- 
age !” His trembling hands were stretched eagerly 
toward Archibald Murray. “ Now, at once — at 
once! In an hour it may b^oo late !” 

“Wait here for me,” said Archie, pressing his 
hand sympathetically. “ I will keep you waiting 
no longer than can possibly be avoided.” 

Half an hour later, a skill, with Archibald Mur- 
ray arid the overseer, McBride, at the oars, shot out 
of the cove and darted like an arrow toward the 
little Island, which lay in a dark mass of verdure a 
mile and a half from the main-land. Hugh Maury 
sat in the stern-seat. 

George Bemish heard the sound of their quick, 
strong rowing long before they reached the spot to ' 
which Archibald Murray had tracked the old man 
on that stolen exploration of his, months before. 
His hearing had grown preternatural ly acute. ' That 
was not his father rowing ! He had been^ prey to 
the keenest anxiety for days. His father had never 
before allowed so long an interval to elapse between ■ 
his visits. His stock of provisions was running low, 
and, he had no means of communicating with the 
main-land. What if those swift, sturdy rowers 


^^8 


A BTMaM^ PlLoniMAG^. 


should be the officers of justice come to fetch him 
to trial for a deed he had never committed ? Who 
else? 

He would not be taken I At that moment he 
cursed himself, for the hundredth time, for having 
flung Hugh Maury’s knife into the bayou that day 
when he had suddenly come upon Adrien’s bleeding 
body. It had never occurred to him that suspicion 
could possibly be turned upon himself. He had 
meant only to dispose of all proof against his friend 
as quickly as possible. 

The boat came nearer and nearer ! He took a 

VI*'- 

loaded pistol in his hand and walked slowly toward 
the spot where his father always landed. Evidently 
some one who knew their trysting-place was in com- 
mand of this expedition. 

Presently there floated to him through the dark- 
ness the familiar signal-whistle. He answered it 
joyously, and almost running toward the spot, called 
out eagerly : 

‘‘ Father !” 

He stopped aghast I By the dim starlight he 
could see three dark forms in the boat. The men 
in the boat could hear the quick click of a trigger. 

^AYho goes there?” he called out, peremptorily. 

‘HI ugh Maury, come to liberate George Be- 
mish !” came back promptly from the man who sat 
in the stern of the boat. 

There was a second of profound stillness ; then the 
sound of a strong man’s sobs broke tempestuously 
upon the quiet night-air. 

Vigorous arms helped the blind man to a firm 


A STEAmE PILQEIMAQE, 


239 


footing on the briery banks. A hand was held out 
to him from above, and there, in the stillness and 
the darkness, with the bright-eyed stars striving to 
illumine the scene of their loving reconciliation, 
Hugh Maury made his peace with the friend who 
had borne the burden of obloquy that was rightfully 
his so long. 

“I pray God it has not come too late to save the 
old man!” said Ben McBride, as the murmur of 
their voices came to them in the boat. 

To which Archibald Murray responded with a 
fervent Amen I” 


240 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE, 


CHAPTEE XX. 


KENUNCIATION. 


OEX-OITT with the fatigue and the excitement 



V V of the day that terminated a long and tire- 
some journey, Hetty slept late and heavily the next 
morning. Into the midst of a confused dream, in 
■which she was trying to prevent mad Parmelie Eose 
from applying the torch to the Avood-work of the 
attic door at home, and pleading Avith her mother 
not to go to Mrs. St. Leger’s dinner-paity in a wind- 
ing-sheet, and contending with the clerk out at 
Hawkspoint because he insisted upon putting a piano- 
stool in the Avagon for her to sit on, there came the 
sound of mingled sobs and laughter. 

Hetty sat bolt upright, Avith a start, and gazed 
confusedly about the unfamiliar premises. 

Land uv Moses, honey, I thought you never Avas 
goin’ to Avake up, and Mars’ Archie tol’ me p’intedly 
you warn’ to be Avoke up.” 

“ Have you seen my cousin ?” 

^‘Seed Mars’ Archie? Ain’t I, though? With 
these ve’y ol’ eyes uv my oAvn, Avhich I neA^er look’ 
forward to no how, honey. An’ ain’t he turn’ out 
that great and impo’tant that fo’ he have time to 
swaller his food good, folks is a-callin’ for him?” 

“ Has he gone ?” said Hetty, falling listlessly back 
among her pilloAvs, 


A STBAmE PILORIMAGE. 


241 


Jus’ for a little ways, honey. He lef word he 
jus’ cross over de lake to Mars’ — Mars’ ” 

“ Glen !” Hetty suggested, with asperity. 

That’s the ve’y name. Mars’ Glen got a ’tack 
of colic, I hear the boy say that come for Archie — 
you is got a good mem’ry, chile — an’ he be back by 
ten o’clock, p’intedly to see you.” 

^^What time is it now i^” Hetty asked, with 
languid indifference. 

On the stroke er nine. Mars’ Maury he come to 
the door an’ tell me to say he hope you ain’ broke 
down wid lookin’ arter him, so helpless lak ; and the 
young gentleman, he send you word, so polite lak, 
that he hope you will consider the whole house at 
yo’ disposal.” 

“The young gentleman? What young gentle- 
man ?” 

“ The old gentleman’s son, which got home ve’y 
unexpected last night arter you an’ me was gone to 
bed. The folks in the kitchen say the ol’ man begin 
to pick up f’om the ve’y moment lies son sot foot 
in his sick-room. I tell you, honey, he is that good- 
looking mos’ anybody would be the better for bein’ 
wid him. He smile jus’ like a angel when he tell 
me to have ev’ything got you kin possubly want. 
£holy de Lord is straightenin’ things up all ’round. 
The folks in the kitchen say ” 

“ Have you told my Cousin Archibald anything 
about home affairs. Aunt Lucy ?” Hetty said, turn- 
ing petulantly from a consideration of any other 
subject — “ about mother, and the fire, and the 


A STJRA2\^G^ FIZGmMAGR 


“Ain’t I, though!” said old Lucy, proudly. 
“ Ain’t him an’ me ben settin’ on the back steps in 
the sun for all the worl’, honey, lak we used to set 
at home when he come back from college, an’ talk, 
an’ talk, an’ talk ! Mars’ Archie ain’ change’ none, 
’ceptin’ he looks a little older, an’ graver, an’ more 
sperienced. The folks in the kitchen say Mars’ 
Archie jus’ cuttin’ a clean swad as he go ’long. He 
at the top of the ladder as a physicianer.” 

Hetty was languidly progressing with her toilet 
all this time. What difference did it make how she 
arranged her hair ? Who cared whether she looked 
pretty or ugly ? Her Cousin Archibald had not al- 
lowed her coming to interfere with his most unim 
portant calls. He had put her aside last night for 
that sick old man, and now he was gone without 
even waiting to give her a good-morning. Was it 
for this she had come so far ? 

Tears of disappointment sprang to her eyes. She 
did not know herself how great had been the strain 
of the past few months upon her system. She sank 
back in a large chair and gave way to such a burst 
of tears as alarmed old Lucy. 

“ Honey, my sweet chile, don’t go on that way. 
You scares ol’ Lucy — you really does, honey. You’s 
hungry, that’s what’s the matter. The young gen- 
tleman say I was to fetch yo’ breakfus’ in here when 
you was ready for it. I gwine fetch it right 
now.” 

She bustled out of sight before Hetty could pre- 
vent her going, and reappeared in an incredibly 
short time, bringing in a large tray, on one end of 


A STMAM^! PILGniMAGM. 

which lay a bunch of roses, whose dewy fragrance 
filled the apartment Avdth sweetness. 

Delicious 1” Hetty cried, seizing them with both 
hands and inhaling their perfume delightedly. 

He cut ’em himself, honey, wid hes ve’y own 
hands.” 

‘‘Who?” 

“ The young gentleman — the old gentleman’s son. 
And seein’ as he don’t know you’s a real purty one, 
my sweet, but mout be real oP and ugly, it shows 
real good - heartedness ; that is just what it 
shows.” 

“ It does, indeed,” said Hetty, “ and you must tell 
him I am very much obliged to him, and that the 
roses did me more good than the breakfast.” 

“ I don’t know ’bout dat. You’s tried the roses 
an’ you ain’t tried the breakfas’,” said Lucy, practi- 
cally ; “ but that’s a real purty speech, an’ ef I can 
recollect it all I’ll tell him, though he toP me to tell 
you he hope you find y o’ self well enough to appear 
at the dinner-table. I tell you, honey, these folks is 
fus’-class. There ain’ no foolin’ Lucy whar quality 
folks is concerned. An’ dar !” 

This final exclamation was caused by Archibald 
Murray’s passage across the strip of lawn which 
Hetty’s window gave to her view. 

“ My boy done got back !” 

“How then,” said Archie, coming in a second 
later ; “ doubtless my little sensitive plant thinks I 
have been treating her cavalierly this morning ; but 
you know, my dear child, that the doctors in a 
country neighborhood have to be like the firemen in 


^44 


A P/10M3/A0R 


a big city — ready to go at the first alarm. The 
distances are so great.” 

How immeasurably young and small he made her 
feel with his “dear child!” and how strong and 
vigorous and handsome he looked, coming in from 
the crisp morning ride across the lake. She was not 
wise enough to read the lines of thoughtful care 
that lay across his broad, smooth forehead, or to 
penetrate the secret of that look of patient endur- 
ance which had darkened and deepened his fine eyes. 

“You have been across the lake to Mr. Glen’s?” 
she said, drawing out of his clasp the hand he held 
“caressingly. 

“ Yes. I never neglect a call from Glencove. It 
was my first home when I came here, and I have 
dear, good friends under its roof.” 

“ Miss Theresa Glen lives there ?” 

“Yes. She is Mr. Glen’s sister, you know.” 

“How should I know anything,” said Hetty, 
bitterly, “when, after you left Yirginia, you never 
wrote a single line back — never but once, and that 
was because you wanted a book ?” 

“ I am afraid I have been very remiss,” Archie 
said, gently ; “ but I was in a great deal of trouble 
when I left Yirginia, and I did not suppose there 
was any one there who cared to enter into a regular 
correspondence with me. I suppose the books were 
all burned up in the fire. Aunt Lucy has given me 
a very graphic account of your loss.” 

“Your loss, my cousin,” Hetty said, laying her 
hand on his. “ Please forgive me my childish petu- 
lance just now. I did feel cross. I thought you 


A STMiTGI^ IHLGMMAaA 


Mo 

disapproved of my coming, and set it d6wn as a 
girlish freak, and wished I had stayed at home.’’ 

‘‘ Why, what an unreasonable little woman it is 1” 
Archie said, lifting her face by putting his hand 
under her chin, and how pretty you have grown. 
Do you know, I have never thought of you as any- 
thing but a kind-hearted, sweet-faced little girl, 
with a big straw hat hanging over her back, just as 
I saw you that first time, you know ?” 

“ Yes, I know it,” she said, with quaint composure, 
interposing George Bemish’s roses between her chin 
and his hand ; but I have a great deal to tell you, 
Cousin Archibald, before Aunt Lucy and I start 
home ” 

Home 1” 

Back,” she said, with a sudden twitching in the 
corners of her mouth ; I don’t suppose I can say 
^ home ’ to any spot on earth; but Doctor Yernon, dear 
old man, told me, after I had given you the things I 
felt I must put into your hands with my own, that 
I must come back to him, and stay there until I 
could form my plans for the future. 

After Mr. Maury had twice risked his life for us 
and come out of that awful fire the poor, scarred 
thing you see him, I could not let him undertake 
this long journey alone. 

He is at peace now as far as his friend is con 
cerned, and when I’ve given the things that are 
yours into your safe keeping I will be ready to go 
back to Virginia.” 

“Let that rest, dear child. We will talk of that 
presently. I confess to feeling culpable at having 


S46 ^ PILGBIMagE, 

left behind me a book which was transmitted to m^ 
with such a significant message from my dear uncle. 
Lucy tells me she gave it to you after my sudden 
departure.” 

Lucy had brought from the pile of luggage on a 
sofa on one side of the room a heavy leather satchel 
while he was talking. 

“ I have never left it out of my sight, nor per- 
mitted any one else to handle it.” 

Dear child, why should you have been so bur- 
dened with the responsibility of my affairs ? I wish 
I could have known and prevented it. How can I 
show my gratitude, little cousin ?” 

We are discussing business, not our emotions, at 
this juncture,” said Hetty, with a touch of asperity 
in her voice she could not entirely control. “ This,” 
she laid a piece of folded paper in his hand, is the 
note that you were expected to discover in this old 
book. I think God directed my hands when I dis- 
placed that old cover. The note would have availed 
you little without the wallet. I had taken it from 
the armoire upstairs not three hours before the fire. 
It is full of letters. This is yours, too.” She placed 
the locked tin box in his hands. 

“As things have ♦ turned out — I mean, poor 
mother’s death — the place Avould have gone to Lem. 
She left a will to that effect, and unless those letters 
prove your superior right, as I believe they will, you 
are still dependent on your own efforts. AVill you 
read them while I am here, cousin ?” 

“We will read them together,” said Archibald, 
loosening the bands that were tied tightly about the 


A STBANOB PIZGBIMAGR U1 

leathern wallet. “We will have no family secrets 
from each other, little cousin.” He took from the 
envelope a double-handful of letters, yellow now 
with age. “ Both written by women, and educated 
women at that.” 

“ They are the copies of letters written by our 
uncle’s (Kichard Dabney’s) wife to her false friend 
Miss Parmelie Eose, and Miss Parmelie Kose’s 
answers to them, and the letters of Lavinia Mur- 
ray to our uncle’s wife.” 

“ Our IJncle Eichard’s wife ?” 

“Yes. But the letters will make it plainer. 
After you have read them all I will tell you what 
Miss Eose told me.” 

For fully an hour there was no audible sound in 
that sunlit spare chamber in the old Bemish house 
hut the soft sound of rustling paper mingled with 
the agitated breathing of one of the readers. 

As fast as he finished a letter he would pass it 
over to Hetty, silently. Sometimes he would read 
them over more than once. She watched his strong 
face with furtive eyes. Its calmness was broken 
up occasionally by violent emotion. When she had 
to ^vait an unusually long time, she found employment 
for her restlessly nervous fingers in plucking the 
petals from George Bemish’s roses and absently de 
vouring them one by one. 

At last the wallet was empty, and a pile of old 
letters lay between the cousins on the sofa where 
they had been sitting side by side while Archibald 
Murray went through the fiercest ordeal of his life. 

“ What do you make of it aU ?” he said, looking 


248 


A STBANGE PILGRIMAGE, 


at Hetty with serious eyes. “And now that ^all 
these dead people have conspired to make me doubt 
my own identity, what is expected of me 

“Do you ask these grave questions of me, the 
^ child,’ the ^ little thing,’ the ^ little cousin,’ whom 
you have only thought of as ” 

“ You do not bear malice, Hetty ?” he said, with 
quick irritation. 

“Ho! For jovi I bear only the deepest, truest 
affection a sister’s heart could bear for a brother !” 
she said, “ and I rejoice to be found worthy to take 
counsel with you at this juncture. What do I make 
of it all ?” > 

“Yes. These letters have dazed me.” 

“ I make of them that you are Kichard Dabney’s 
son and legal heir — not his nephew, dependent upon 
chance for your inheritance ! I make of it that your 
so-called mother, Lavinia Murray, combined with 
your real mother to introduce you into your father’s; 
home, and through his affection for you she, your 
much- wronged mother, hoped for final reconciliation. 
I suppose Aunt Lavinia’s death frustrated the de- 
sign.” 

“ But my mother ?” 

“ She is dead, too. Poor Miss Eose ! It was the 
horror of that death-scene — when she had to bear 
the reproaches of the dying woman for her treach- 
ery — that finally unhinged her mind.” 

Then she told him circumstantially all that had 
occurred during her visit to Parmelie Eose. 

There was a long silence between them when she 
got through. 


A STBAJ^GB PIZaJiiMAGM. 249 

Tliei'e only remains to examine the tin box,” she 
said, taking from her purse a small, flat key and 
laying it in his hand. 

It fitted into the lock readily and turned easily. 
As Archibald lifted the lid a faint perfume stole 
from a covering of pink cotton that lay over the con- 
tents. This removed, a blaze of jewels flashed their 
prismatic hues into their eyes. Emeralds, diamonds, 
pearls, rubies, a royal collection — worthy to be a 
king’s ransom. 

Oh, beautiful !” Hetty’s feminine instincts came 
to relieve tlie somber tint of this passage into by- 
gone times. 

‘‘They are superb. I think we’ll have to lock 
them away for your wedding-gift.” 

“Mine! Hot so, my cousin. If report speaks 
true. Miss Theresa Glen’s stately beauty will look 
all the more ravishing for such adornment.” 

She turned and clasped his hands in both of hers. 

“ And oh, cousin 1 My dear, dear cousin ! it does 
make me glad to think that I should be the one to 
bring you such good tidings. That I, who helped to 
defraud you and drive you away from your herit- 
age, should be chosen as the one to rescue from 
perishing all the evidences of your inalienable right 
to your home. How that you are rich once more, 
you can marry the woman you love. You do love 
her, cousin ?” 

He drew her toward him and kissed her tenderly ; 
then he got up to go away from her with a face so 
full of trouble that her own clouded with perplexity. 

“ y ou have never defrauded me, little cousin. Y ou 


250 


A STRAm^ PiLGRtMAGR. 


have done me good and not evil, all the days of 
your life. Theresa Glen’s stately beauty will never 
be enhanced by the Dabney family jewels. The 
box and its contents are all yours.” 

He left the room abruptly, leaving her staring in 
wonder. 


A FILGI^/MAGB, 


‘251 


CPIAPTEE XXL 

CKOSS-PUEPOSES. 

J OSEPHIXE, Miss Theresa Glen’s maid, resorted 
to a great many illegal devices that morning to 
arouse her mistress from slumber. Josephine was 
surcharged with news. So much had happened over 
yonder, just across the lake, at Doctor Bemish’s, 
which she was extremely anxious to be the first to 
impart. If she permitted her mistress to leave the 
room without emptying her budget of information, 
then the superlative pleasure of telling it all would 
be Mrs. Glen’s. 

Josephine considered herself an authority on Be- 
mish matters, seeing that her ^^beau,” Abram 
Drake, to whom she proposed to be joined in the 
holy bonds of wedlock the coming Christmas, was 
the old doctor’s personal attendant, and was rarely 
ever away from him. 

Abram had gladly volunteered to row Doctor 
Murray over in response to Mrs. Glen’s early sum- 
mons that morning. Seeing Josephine was on the 
other side, and while the doctor had been busy al- 
leviating Mr. Glen’s colicky pangs, Abram had been 
pouring all the family news into Josephine’s attent- 
ive ear as she sat perched on the bow of the skiff 
waiting for the doctor’s reappearance. And of a 
truth, there had been plenty to tell this time, 


m 


A BTBAmE PILGRIMAGE. 


Every other device failing, Josephine men- 
daciously stumbled over a* footstool finally, and 
brouo^ht down with a crash the tall screen that she 
had so carefully placed, only an hour before, be- 
tween the foot of the bed and the window, where 
the late morning sunshine streamed in through the 
slats of the outside shutters. 

What on earth is the matter ?” Theresa asked, 
opening her eyes languidly on the scene of 
Josephine’s tumultuous service. 

“ iS’othin’, Miss Thersie, jus’ nothin’ ’t all. I’s a 
good-for-nothin’ awkerd nigger, an’ jes didn’ see dat 
footstool ; wouldn’ a-seed it ef it’d ben as big* as de 
side uv a house. I reckon you gwine git up now. 
Miss Thersie ?” 

What time is it ?” Theresa asked, indifferently. 
Why should she get up ? The days were so long 
and empty and vapid ! It was so hard to know 
what to do with them. Fanny had Leonard and 
Paul and her garden and her household affairs to 
chatter about and fill the days up with ! Leonard 
had Fanny and Paul and the crops to look after. 
Paul had his own child’s world, full of real joys and 
blissful imaginings ; but what had she ? She closed 
her eyes heavily after asking that idle question of 
her maid. What mattered it what hour of the day 
it was ? Let the hours come and go ; they brought 
nothing to her. FTothing but the listless perform- 
ance of soulless duties; passionate suppression of 
longings that could never be satisfied ; self -con- 
demning and fresh bruisings to her pride. 
Self-condemning in that, when Archibald Murray 


A STEAJ^^GJS PILGRIMAGE. 


253 


had knelt by her side one morning and called him- 
self her lover, she had smiled on him and let him see 
all too plainly into the depths of her heart — let 
him see that his words gave her happiness. Fresh 
bruisings for her pride in that she could not force 
herself into an unfeigned indifference as to the 
strange sequel to that one moment of passionate 
joy. She had tried so hard to piece together the 
fragments of that harrowing morning when, com- 
pletely undone by the nervous shock of her last 
mesmeric interview with Doctor Bemish, she had 
spent so many hours alternating between conscious- 
ness and unconsciousness. 

She recalled one blissful moment of consciousness 
that had showed her Archibald Murray kneeling 
close by her side, his eyes looking lovingly into hers, 
his voice calling her name in tones of the deepest 
tenderness. Ah ! if she could have passed away for- 
ever in that moment ! 

She had passed away temporarily — lapsed once 
more into unconsciousness, only to come back to find 
Archibald Murray again by her side, discussing her 
physical condition with her sister-in-law in a 
strangely matter-of-fact voice, leaving directions for 
tlie administering of certain bitter doses, administer- 
ing the bitterest of all himself when he told her, in 
that curiously constrained voice, that she needed 
but to obey the directions he had left with her 
sister in order to be soon quite herself, and then had 
taken formal leave of her ! 

She remembered wondering why he had selected 
thait time for his sudden removal into the village of 


254 


A STJ^AJ^^GU PILGRIMAGE. 


Ilawkspoint. There could be but one solution to it. 
He had repented him of that impulsive confession ! 
His words of tenderness had meant nothing. He 
wanted her to consider them unsaid by his sudden 
and complete removal from her proximity. Since 
then he had only come to Glencove on professional 
business. Ah ! well, she could match pride against 
pride in a contest with Lucifer himself, if need be ! 

Since then, though, the world had seemed very 
empty and the daj^^s dragged drearily. Why should 
she lengthen them by rising with the thrifty alert- 
ness of a woman who had happy household cares 
and pleasing domestic anxieties to spur her through 
the long sunlit hours ? 

Josephine, in a spasm of remorse for her own 
duplicity, had quietly seated herself near the win- 
dow with her knitting, when her mistress asked 
again : 

“ What time is it, Josephine 

The maid careened her turbaned head sufficiently 
to one side to get a view of the mantel clock : 

“ By dis clock,” she said, oracularly, tain’t but 
half-pas’ nine ; but I sholy think you is slow, for I 
know it mus’ a-ben mo’n an hour sence Abram an’ 
de doctor done lef, an’ I yhere de doctor tell Miss 
Fanny he couldn’ wait no longer, kase hes cousin 
would be lookin’ for him anxious, an’ he lef’ word 
for her he’d be back to tek brekfis’ wid her, less’n 
Mars’ Glen were ve’y sick, which he didn’ have 
nothin’ but cramps from too much watermillion, 
honey.” 

Josephine had composed this skillful prologue 


A srnAmw pilghimage. 


255 


while impatiently waiting for the moment of its 
delivery. She flattered herself that she had art- 
fully condensed therein sufficient material to pique 
even her Miss Thersie’s languid curiosity into active 
operation. She was not disappointed. Theresa 
raised herself on one elbow and asked quickly : 

“ Is my brother ill 

nothing hut cramps from watermilhon, honey. 
You know Mars’ Glen is got a weakness that way, 
but the doctor gin him the word wid the bark on it 
this time. He say p’intedly Mars’ Glen’s got to lef’ 
’em alone.” 

What doctor ?” 

Doctor Murray in co’se,” said Josephine, placing 
dressing-slippers and gown suggestively in front of 
the young lady. 

“What cousin are you talking about, Josephine?” 
her mistress asked, looking at her confusedly, while 
she mechanically permitted herself to be invested in 
gown and slippers. 

“ Doctor Murray’s cousin. Abram say he ain’t 
seen her yet, but he says the old colored lady which 
come from Virginia wid her and Mars’ Hugh Maury 
talk lak she were a none such. They all got yhere 
late las’ night, Abram say, an’ the young lady warn’t 
up w’en he row de doctor over here.” 

The perplexed look had been deepening on her 
mistress’ face all this time, and Josephine’s moment 
of triumph had come : 

“ ^ Hugh Maury V ‘ All got here last night !’ 
Who are ‘all,’ Josephine? What are you talking 
about ?” 


256 


A STJ^AJVG^ PILGRIMAGE. 


‘‘ I’s talking ’bout Doctor Murray’s cousin. Abram 
say be sorter gether, from the wa}^ the old colored 
lady talk, that her an’ the doctor is ben ol’ sweet- 
hearts, an’ now that her ma is dead, an’ can’t stan’ 
betwix ’em no longer, they gwine git married right 
off.” 

Yes,” said Theresa, turning very white and sink- 
ing limply into an arm-chair by the dressing-table. 
“ I see, I see !” She laughed mirthlessly. “ But 
who do you mean by ‘ all V ” 

“ Her, and Mars’ George Bemish, and Mars’ Hugh 
Maury, and the ol’ colored lady. Abram say they 
all come together las’ night from somewhar, he ain’t 
quite clar whar ; an’ Abram say from the ve’y mo- 
ment Mars’ George Bemish put hes head inside the 
ol’ man’s bed-room and say, ‘Father, I come home 
to stay wid you, Hugh’s made it all right !’. the oP 
gentleman begin t’ men’. Abram say Doctor Mur- 
ray thought he were goin’ to die las’ night, but now 
he say he’s all right.” 

Josephine had nothing to complain of in her list- 
ener. Theresa submitted to be dressed with the 
passivity of a doll stuffed with sawdust, and while 
Josephine combed, brushed and curled her pretty 
hair, buttoned her boots, and tied the long sash- 
ends of her morning- wrapper about her slim waist, 
she sat in a sort of trance, trying to elucidate tlie 
strange story of these strange happenings over yon- 
der at Doctor Bemish’s. 

She was quite dressed at last, but nervelessly dis- 
inclined to leave her room in quest of breakfast. 

“ Bring me a cup of coffee here,” she said, petu 


A STEANGB PILGRIMAGE. 


257 


lantly, twitching the ribbons out of Josephine’s 
clinging fingers. I don’t want any breakfast.” 

She rested her head against the tall back of her 
chair and closed her eyes. She was enraged with 
herself to feel that hot, scalding tears were risina* 
beneath their lids. 

What a w^eakling I am become !” she said, spring- 
ing passionately to her feet as the door closed on 
Josephine’s receding form. What difference does 
it make to me if a thousand cousins come to claim 
him ?” 

Mrs. Glen’s bright face was suddenly thrust 
through the shutters of the window that opened on 
the gallery. Her face was full of importance this 
morning. 

Do come out of this dungeon, Thersie. I am 
dying to tell you the news. Would have waked 
you up two hours ago, but Josephine says you were 
very restless last night.” 

I suspect that Josephine had an object in keep- 
ing you at bay,” Theresa answered, with her gayest 
laugli. “ She wanted to be the first to tell the won- 
derful tidings that Doctor Murray’s pretty cousin 
has come all the way from Yirginia, with her col- 
ored mammy, to consummate their long engagement, 
and that George Bemish and Hugh Maury have 
come back together to straighten out that horrid 
affair of Adrien Michelet. You see I know it all.” 

“ A good deal more than I do,” said Mrs. Glen, 
looking perplexedly into the beautiful flushed face 
of the girl who had just treated a matter which had 
^.Iways beeu spoken of in the family circle with 


258 


A STJiAJ}^G£^ PILGRIMAGE. 


bated breath with such shocking flippancy. “ Doc- 
tor Murray told me that a young cousin of his had 
arrived, most unexpectedly to him, last night, bring- 
ing with her important family papers which she was 
afraid to intrust to the mail.” 

Theresa laughed skeptically. 

“ He really seemed worried how to dispose of her. 
She can’t stay over at Doctor Bemish’s with a house- 
ful of men, you know.” 

“ I imagine he won’t be at a loss long. But about 
the others — George Bemish and Hugh Maury. I 
knew they would come back together some time, if 
both of them were alive.” 

“ y ou knew it and never told even your brother 
or me ?” 

“ Yes. I knew that Hugh Maury had gone on a 
pilgrimage in search of the friend he had wronged — 
knew that his only chance of peace on earth lay in 
finding George Bemish. I am not taken unawares 
by that. I was not called on to criminate the man 
who had struck that rash blow for my sake, was I ?” 

“ But the strangest part of the whole story you 
don’t know — you can’t know ; for Doctor Murray 
told it to Leonard and me with closed doors. Hugh 
Maury has come home a hero and a martyr !” 

In the sight of man, perhaps ; in the sight of 
God a murderer, once and forever!” Theresa said, 
gravely. 

Such a deathly pallor spread over her tortured 
face that Mrs. Glen flung wide open the long shut- 
ters and drew her through them out into th^ 
fresher air of the gallery. 


A SfBAJVajS PILGRIMAGE, 

‘^ Doctor Murray asked me to tell you all about 
this affair, Thersie, as soon as you awoke. He said 
he thought you would be glad to know that George 
Bemish was once more at home with his father, 
freed from every suspicion. You are trembling. I 
will tell you the rest Avhile you eat your breakfast.” 

She led the trembling girl into the breakfast-room, 
and after seeing her well supplied with food, with 
which she toyed mechanically, Mrs. Glen resumed : 

Doctor Murray says that Doctor Bemish begs to 
see you as soon as possible. He says George looks 
‘ thin and rather rough,’ was his expression, but that 
he is undoubtedly one of the handsomest and most 
winning young fellows he ever met.” 

“ Did Doctor Murray row over here early this 
morning just to chant the praises of the returned 
prodigal ?” Theresa asked, sharply. 

“I don’t think he is the prodigal at all,” Mrs. 
Glen answered, quietly ignoring the sharpness. “ He 
says poor Hugh Maury is an absolute wreck — walks 
on crutches and has lost the use of both ej^es. It 
seems he has been teaching in the young lady’s 
family, and their house caught on fire and he heroic- 
ally risked his life by rushing into the burning house 
where some one told him an old negro woman was 
confined. It was this very old woman, too, who has 
come here with him and Doctor Murray’s cousin. 
They brought him home — he was too helpless to 
travel alone. The old darky naturally adores him.” 

‘‘ The way of the transgressor is hard 1 Perhaps,” 
Theresa said, in a voice of pure pity, God will 
judge him more leniently than man can, and Avill 


A -PILGUIMAGM. 


call his expiation complete. It was a mad, rash, 
foolish thing that he did, and he wrapped my life in 
the gloom of it. Has he done well in coming back 
here 

“lie came back here to clear George Bemish’s 
name from suspicion. He was compelled to give up 
his search for him, in his maimed condition. His 
intention now is to inform the authorities of the 
entire transaction. He says if they see fit to arrest, 
imprison, try and execute the remnant of Hugh 
Maury which he has brought back here, he shall 
make no opposition. He says that when he heard 
Adrien Michelet’s scoffing laugh following him down 
the road where 3 ^ou and he Avere driving, he sprang 

from the buggy meaning only to ” 

Theresa raised her hand imploringly : 

“For God’s sake spare me! Hugh Maury has 
shoAvn depths of nobility I did not believe him ca- 
pable of. He has shielded me at his own expense 
long enough 1 Tell my brother, Fanny (I cannot 
talk of this again), that if it comes to a question of a 
public trial for the killing of Adrien Michelet, to let 
me know. Then, but not before then, I Avill tell the 
entire provocation to that fearful deed. Ho jury on 
earth Avould harm a hair of Hugh Maury’s head 
after hearing my statement.” 

“ Hear child ! poor, poor Thersie ! how much you 
have endured, Avith no one to help you,” said Mrs. 
Glen, Aveaving her arms caressingly about her sister- 

in-laAv’s neck. “ I never kneAv before hoAv ” 

“ Don’t fall into any more mistakes, Fanny,” Miss 
Glen said, firmly ; “ don’t imagine that that aAvful 


A STMAWGM PILGRIMAGE 361 

affair has broken my heart. It shocked me im- 
measurably, and I think if I had loved Hugh Maury 
very much it would have killed me. 

I shall never know why I had promised to marry 
him. Poor man ! In his helpless condition, who will 
care for him ? Ho mother, no sister !” 

“ The Bemishes ! Depend upon that. He will never 
want for friends. Doctor Murray says Miss Ogden 
is devoted to him. He says Hugh saved her life 
once when she was skating and went through the ice.” 

Mrs Glen here pulled out her watch. 

By the way, Thersie, I promised Doctor Murray 
I would come over after dinner and see if Miss 
Ogden would not come here to stay for the few days 
she will be compelled to wait for a packet. I can’t 
leave a young girl in a house full of stupid men, you 
know. And, besides, I want to see the others.” 

“ Did Doctor Murray ask this ?” Theresa asked. 

‘^Ho. Stupidly enough he did not seem to have 
seen any impropriety in her staying at Doctor 
Bemish’s.” 

Theresa arose from the table unsteadily and held by 
the back of her chair, as she said : 

When you are ready to go for Miss Ogden, come 
for me, Fanny. I will go with you.” 

“ Do you think you can stand it, dear ?” 

“ Stand what ?” she asked, haughtily. 

The trip,” Mrs. Glen answered, looking at her 
pale face and twitching limbs in anxious concern. 

Oh, yes, I can stand the trip,” Theresa said with 
a hysterical laugh ; “ I should think by this time you 
had discovered I can stand anything.” 


^62 


A STBAm^I PILOMIMAGK 


CHAPTEK XXII. 

THE MAJESTY OF THE LAW. 

M KS. GLEX did not find it such a simple mat- 
ter to fulfill her promise to Archibald Mur- 
ray about coming across the lake to see Hetty that 
afternoon. There were various impediments in the 
way when she came to make her arrangements, 
chief among them being the lack of a conveyance. 

Mr. Glen, miraculously relieved of his physical 
discomfort by hearing of the wondrous happen- 
ings over at Doctor Bemish’s the night just gone, 
had hurried off alone before dinner to see George 
Bemish and to consult with the other men about 
Hugh Maury’s situation. 

He had always been excessively fond of George, 
and was correspondingly rejoiced over the happy 
turn events had taken for him. Moreover, Murray 
had engaged him, as one of the leading and most 
influential citizens in the parish, to go with him into 
Hawkspoint that morning to make a statement con- 
cerning Hugh Maury, preparatory to the voluntary 
surrender of himself, which the returned pilgrim was 
resolved upon. 

Truth to tell, the movements of his women-folks 
did not concern him at all that morning, there was 
matter of so much graver import on hand. 

Of course Leonard had to take the only decent 


A sthange pilgrimage. 


263 


skiff in the boat-house,” Mrs. Glen said tartly, when 
she came to report to Theresa that they ‘‘would 
have to wait for the old boat to be caulked” 

“Did brother know you had any intention of 
going over at all?” Theresa asked, with that fine 
sense of justice which never forsook her. 

“ ]^o ; but men are so selfish that if he had it 
wouldn’t have made a particle of difference,” Mrs. 
Glen answered, logically. “ I will call you as soon 
as there is any sign of Tim’s being ready. You 
know it takes him a year to do Avhat any one else 
could do in an hqur.” 

“ Poor Timothy ! Evidently my little sister is 
consumed with impatience to see some one on the 
other side of the lake. Is it the returned native or 
the Doctor’s pretty cousin ?” 

Theresa turned from the mirror where she had 
been tying the soft mull strings of her white straw 
hat under her smooth chin with unusual delibera- 
tion for her. She was in a state of complete and 
dainty readiness for the start. Mrs. Glen looked 
her over from head to foot in admiring silence before 
bursting forth, inconsequently : 

“Thersie, you are perfect, this morning! Just 
superb 1 Why don’t you do it oftener ?” 

“ Do what oftener ?” Theresa asked, composedly, 
shaking the folds out of a lace-trimmed parasol 
which had been buttoned and furled for many a day. 

“ Fix yourself up that way.” 

“ Do I look fixed up ? Horrors !” She arched her 
eyebrows comically in an assumption of distress. 
“ Surely a white nun’s veiling that has done service 


264 


A STEAJ^GB PILGRIMAGE. 


for two seasons, an old straw hat trimmed with 
mull muslin, and a fresh hunch of violets do not com- 
prise a very elaborate get-up.’- 

I don’t know what it is. It must be your high 
color, then, or your eyes — gracious, hoAV they do 

sparkle ! — or that Thank goodness, there’s Tim 

bawling for us now. Don’t forget your parasol! 
Hadn’t we better take an umbrella, sc Ave can both 
sit behind it ? The setting sun Avill be right in our 
eyes all the way over.” 

Theresa said, curtly. This parasol will 
answer for both.” 

She did not propose to mar the effect of her ar- 
tistic design by supporting a hideous black alpaca 
umbrella during the two miles of Avater-travel they 
had before them. 

Yes, ‘^design!” The last time she had been in a 
boat alone with Archibald Murray — oh, hoAV long 
ago it seemed now — he had daringly criticised her 
cool, fresh costume, and his eyes had said more than 
his Avords that day. She Avanted him to see that 
even though she knew he Avas the pledged lover of 
this girl Avhom she Avas going over to greet gra- 
ciously, her OAvn adornment Avas a matter of fastidi- 
ous import still. He could scarcely think, after this 
afternoon, that his- Avords or glances carried any 
Aveight with them. She Avas glad of her beauty to- 
day. 

As Mrs. Glen rushed tumultuously out of the 
room at Timothy’s first Halloo !” Theresa deliber- 
ately turned to take one more look at herself in the 
long mirror, She smiled at her majestic refiection, 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. ^65 

“ I am glad my cheeks are burning,” she said, lay- 
ing the back of her cool white hand against them, 
one after the other ; “ glad that my eyes have 
caught fire, too. I don’t think I look like a woman 
who has been stabbed to the heart by a child’s 
hand !” 

She rearranged the violets in her belt and joined 
Mrs. Glen, who was already seated in the skiff, with 
a face studiously divested of all traces of the fierce 
storm that had swept her soul since her late awaken- 
ing that morning. She was serenely handsome that 
afternoon. 

On the other side of the lake, Hugh Maury, rest- 
ing his crutches against the thorny trunk of a 
honey-locust which grew out upon the bank quite a 
distance above the doctor’s front gate, was sitting 
on a fallen log with his hands clasped before him 
and his head drooped forward— a listless attitude 
which had become common with him since losing 
the use of his eyes. 

Hetty was sitting beside him on the log. He had 
come to her room-door an hour or two before with 
a pathetic plea. 

“ The sun is setting. Miss Hetty,” he had said, 
and I know just how the dear old lake used to look 
at this time of the day ; yet I think I should like to 
see it once more. You have been eyes for me, dear 
child, for months now. I vrant you to walk a bit 
up the lake bank with me, to the old honey-locust. I 
can lead you straight to it with these poor, sight- 
less eyes of mine. I want to know just how it all 
looks, on this side and on the other. If there have 


OGG ^ STRANGE PILGRIMA GE. 

been any changes I can detect them in your descrip- 
tion. I should like to take a photograph of it all 
away in my heart. Will you come with me ?” 

There were tears in her eyes when she had opened 
the door to him. She would not trust her voice 
with anything more than a prompt ‘‘certainly” just 
then. 

It had been such a trying, bewildering sort of day 
to her. 

She had thrown her black veil over her head with- 
out other covering and joined him at once. It was 
he who had piloted her through the long privet- 
hedging that led by the side of the house to a gate, 
going directly on to the lake. It was he who led 
the way, slowly and tediously on his clumsy 
crutches, along the grassy, sloping banks to where 
the spreading branches of the thorn offered them 
shelter from the hot rays of the slanting sunshine 
and the fallen log invited them to rest. Then she 
asked, taking his crutches away from him and . seat- 
ing him with that matter-of-course sisterliness 
which had come to her naturally since his mishap : 

“ What do you mean by wanting to take . a photo- 
graph away in your heart, Mr. Maury ? I thought 
your pilgrimage ended here, and that here you 
would cast anchor.” 

“ Hot yet, dear child, not yet !” 

How could he tell her that his pilgrimage would 
lead him on the morrow to the doors of the jail he 
had so long evaded ? How could he tell her that the 
majesty of the law might consign him to a sadder 
anchorage than her pure fancy could even picture ? 


A STBAJiGi; PILGRIMAOE. 


267 


She only knew his past in part — knew that he had 
wronged his friend in some way, but had now re- 
stored him to home and honor. But she did not 
know that in doing this he had calmly counted the 
cost and was ready to abide by the decision of his 
peers. 

He Avished she might never know this last sad- 
dest, darkest chapter in his whole career. 

‘‘ I don’t think — I should not think,” said Hetty, 
speaking once more, hesitatingly, that you Avould 
be permitted to go aAvay by yourself. jOh, if only I 
had a home to take you to — you, Avho risked so much 
for me and mine — you should never, never, never 
leave it ! But think of it ! What a leaf upon the 
current I am ! Mamma gone, the boys scattered, 

my cousin ” She stopped. There Avere tears 

in her eyes. ^^Ho one but Aunt Lucy left to 
me.” 

“ There, there, poor, tired little soul ! To think 
that I should whine like a whipped spaniel in your 
presence,” said Hugh, soothingly. “ Come, tell me 
what you see, Hetty — tell me all that you see. I 
could not ask any one else to do me the service — 
they Avould have taken me for a dotard. Picture 
it for me, child — earth, Avater and sky, just as they 
lie stretched out before you noAV.” 

Hetty turned her eyes aAvay from the drawn and 
haggard features of the poor Avreck by her side and 
began in a soft, SAveet monotone : 

‘‘ I see a beautiful lake,” she said, lying bathed 
in the brightest sunshine. The sun is setting in a 
bank of rose-colored clouds, and the Avater, as far as 


268 


A SlBAmJS PILORIMAOE, 


the eye can reach, lies rose-red under the crimsoned 
sky.” 

“ I have seen it just that way so often, so often !” 
Hugh murmured, softly. Go on ; you describe it 
prettily.” 

^^And I see across the lake, on the other side, 
broad fields of brown corn-tassels and bushy cotton- 
plants. I can see the negroes moving along the 
green lanes of the cotton with hoes and plows. 
They are singing, at their work, happy, wild bits of 
songs ” 

Yes, I hear them — I hear them ! That is Glen- 
cove across there. It stretches all along the lake- 
front. There is a tall orange-hedging at one part 
of it — just down that way.” 

^‘Yes — down toward the lower end, where the 
trees and the shrubs grow thick behind a gleaming 
white fence, and where the red-brick chimney, on 
the outside of the white house, can just be seen 
through the green trees.” 

Yes, yes. That is Glencove.” 

Glencove ?” there was a nervous catch in the 
young girl’s voice. Is that where my cousin’s — 
where ” 

“ That is where Miss Theresa Glen lives,” said ' 
Hugh Maury, with no perceptible tremor in his 
voice. For him, there would be no marrying nor 
giving in marriage in this world. He did not even 
mean that Theresa should look upon his maimed and 
altered form. For him, women’s vows and women’s 
caresses were things less attainable than the celestial 
heights. He wondered at his own impassive condh 


A ST£AJ^a£I PILGRIMAGE. 


269 


tion. He could only account for it on the score of 
his absolute and single-hearted devotion to one idea 
for the past four years. There had been no room in 
his soul for any other desire than to atone for his 
crime by exculpating George Bemish. 

‘‘ She whom you loved once said Hetty, with 
gentle boldness. 

Yes, once; but all that happened centuries ago, 
my child. In front of the white house with the 
brick chimney is ” 

“ Come, don’t spoil our photograph !” 

“ A Little boat-house, and lily-pads are all around 
about it. It has a gayly-painted roof — the boat- 
house, I mean.” 

“ Yes,‘yes, I know, I know.” 

“ On this side of the lake,” Hetty continued, turn- 
ing her eyes away from the home of Theresa Glen, 
“ I see a skiff coming rapidly in this direction. 
The willows along the bank must have been hiding 
it. It has three people in it. The oarsman is a 
black man, and — wait ; they’ve gone behind another 
clump of those water-willows; I think they are 
afraid of the hot sun — the passengers are two ladies. 
They have a big white parasol held between us and 
them. I can only see that one of them has on a 
dark blue dress, and the other d white one.” 

The sound of oars came closer. Tim was hugging 
the bank closely in order to give his passengers the 
full benefit of the shade cast by the trees on the bank. 
As the cooler shadows fell across the bow of their 
boat. Miss Glen shifted the parasol and let its handle 
rest upon her shoulder. Its pink silk lining formed 


270 A STEAmE PILORIMAOE. 

an effective background to her white straw hat and 
the lovely face it framed. The boat glided close 
enough for Hetty to have thrown her handkerchief 
into the lap of the beautiful woman, who, in her 
turn, was scanning the sweet pale face under the 
clinging black veil with burning eyes. 

The lessening sound of the oars caught Hugh 
Maury’s strained ear. 

They have passed !” he said, quickly. 

“Yes!” There was again that catch in Hetty’s 
voice. 

“ Who ? What ? What was it, Hetty ?” 

“ A vision of fair women 1” said Hetty,. dreamily. 
“Oh! how beautiful she is. How handsome the 
other one is, too. The younger one is radiant !” 

“ Describe them.” 

“ The one — the one who wore the dark blue dress 
had a pretty round waist, and shining black hair, and 
bright, bright eyes. She Avas dark, and looked as if 
she might be one of those brisk and quick AA^omen in 
all her ways, and so neat that everybody around her 
has to be, too. Oh, the very tie of her bonnet- 
strings shoAved that ; but the other ” 

“ Yes — the — other ” 

“ She Avas tall and stately, and her hair was like 
fine-spun gold ; and her eyes — such Avonderful eyes 
I don’t knoAv hoAV to tell you about them ; violet, 
perhaps — seemed to look one through and through ! 
She was dressed all in pure Avhite, and she AAwe 
a big bunch of purple violets in her belt ” 

“ I caught their breath! Yes, their sweetness is 
in the air yet She always loved the violets so,” 


A STBAJSTGE PILGRIMAGE. 

“ And that is ” Hetty asked, eagerly. 

‘‘ That is Miss Theresa Glen,” said Hugh Maury, 
slowly and distinctly. A very beautiful woman, 
but — she has her sting. She can be merciless.” 

A long silence fell between them. Hugh’s interest 
in the landscape had waned. Hetty’s skill as a 
word-painter had failed her. The sound of receding 
oars died away entirely. 

The vision of fair women had passed. 

In the boat Mrs. Glen was saying to her sister-in- 
law, in a voice of intense pity : 

Did you see him, Thersie ? Did you see those 
crutches leaning against the tree ? Poor, poor fel- 
low ! what a wreck he is. It must be Hugh Maury.” 

“ I was not looking at the man. I don’t think it 
occurred to me that Mr. Maury would be out on the 
bank, either. I was looking at the young lady. I 
think you must be mistaken about her companion.” 

may be mistaken. I hope I am,” Mrs. Glen 
said, hurriedly. I looked at the girl, too, but I 
could not see anything but a pair of big eyes under 
a black veil.” 

But I imagine there is a good deal more to the 
young lady than we have seen yet,” said Theresa, 
composedly. 

But of a sudden her assumed composure was 
violently broken up, and she clutched Mrs. Glen’s 
arm in both her hands while she almost hissed into 
her ears : 

‘‘"Why did he come back here? What did he 
mean by coming back here to make me live the hor- 
ror of that time over once more ? Why did you not 


A BTIIANGS) PILGRIMAGE. 


m 

tell me lie was here, here in this very house ? How 
should I knoAV it? Why did you let me come? 
Look — do you see that wagon coming up the road ?” 

Mrs. Glen did look. A wagonette drawn by two 
horses was whirling through the dusty lane that lay 
between Doctor Bemish’s house and his stables. 
There were two men sitting in it — men whom the 
ladies from Glencove knew only by sight. 

Timothy, standing up to cast the chain of his 
boat about the peg driven into the bank, gasped out 
in unreasoning terror : 

De Shurif, Mr. Miles an’ lies deputy ! Bless de 
lam’, who he arter ?” 

The wagon halted in the lane but a second. 

The women in the skiff saw the men in the wagon 
lean over the side of the vehicle and ask a question 
of a negro who had just opened the gate to the 
mule-lot. The negro raised his hand and pointed 
toward the honey-locust. The wagon drove off rap- 
idly in that direction. 

‘‘ Fool, fool, rash fool, to come back !” Mrs. Glen 
cried, wringing her hands in despair. ‘‘And the 
men! Where are they — George, and the doctor, 
and Leonard? I thought they were to prevent 
this ?” 

Ho answer came from the quiet house ; no answer 
came from Theresa Glen as she stepped from the 
swaying boat, and, walking rapidly up the sloping 
bank, stood there waiting for the sheriff and his 
deputy. 

They came presently. On the back seat of the 
vehicle sat a motionless figure. Beside him on ..he 


A BTilAME PTLOIUMa&R ^7;) 

seat lay a pair of Orutcbes, Theresa raised her 
hand imperiously. The driver drew rein, and both 
men lifted their hats, holding them aloft while the 
stately lady, not heeding nor caring that her soft 
white draperies lay against the defiling, dusty 
wheels, stepped close up to Hugh Maury’s side and 
laid upon his folded hands the bunch of violets that 
had rested in her belt a second before. 

‘‘ Theresa — Miss Glen !” 

Her name broke in a cry of mingled terror and 
gladness, from Hugh Maury’s white lips — terror 
that she should have seen him thus, gladness for 
the sweet womanliness of her thought for him. 

“ I wanted you to know that friends were near !” 
she said, softly ; then, with a gesture to the driver, 
she stepped backward from between the dusty 
wheels and turned her face steadily in the direction 
of the honey-locust, where Hetty Ogden stood alone, 
frightened, bewildered. 


274 


A STBANOE PILGRIMAGE. 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

GtriLTY OB NOT GUILTY? 


SPECIAL midsummer term of court had been 



convened in the judicial district to which the 
little town of Hawkspoint appertained. 

Never had that slumberous locality been so pro- 
foundly stirred. Every vacant room in every 
house known to be available to the general public 
had been engaged for a certain date weeks before- 
hand. The hospitality of the most exclusive private 
house was invaded and taxed to the utmost, and 
that in the dull season. 

Mid- August ! The cotton-fields spread their 
snowy pennons under a scorching sky. The corn- 
fields lay parched and yellow, ready for the harvest. 
Along the dusty public road vehicle after vehicle 
rolled noiselessly toward the httle brick court-house, 
about whose open doors and windows the hot air 
quivered visibly. 

Horsemen shunned the thick clouds of dust raised 
by the rolling of innumerable wheels and gal- 
loped along the grassy crest of the levee. The heat 
was no deterrent to speed ; the one danger was that 
of being too late. The mail-clerk out at the land- 
ing, who was imperatively confined to the store to 
await the arrival of the mail-packet, chafed and 
fumed openly at its abnormal slowness. The col- 


A PILGRIMAGE, 


275 


ored drivers of ox-teams, which were plodding their 
way townward laden with cord-Avood, prodded their 
slow beasts Avith such unwonted persistency that 
they essayed a clumsy boAune trot, Avith huge red 
tongues lolling from their exasperated jaAvs. 

There Avas but one thing Avorth striving for that 
day. Every one Avanted to be in time for the open- 
ing of Hugh Maury’s trial. This was the day that 
the State had appointed to give him a hearing in 
that matter of the killing of George Bemish’s 
French tutor, A\^ ho had been found dead in Doctor 
Bemish’s lane, murdered — as had been believed for 
four years — by George Bemish’s own hand, upon 
little or no provocation. 

There was so much of unusual interest attaching 
to this trial that high and low, old and young, men 
and Avomen of pure Caucasian lineage or of hum- 
blest slave estate, rich and poor, journeyed and hur- 
ried through the SAveltering heat of that August 
day to hear AAuth their oAvn ears and see Avith their 
own eyes Avhat the long-delayed verdict was to 
be. 

There Avas the voluntary return of the true crimi- 
nal, Avhom no one had ever suspected, and the giving 
of himself up to the authorities. The story had al- 
ready gone abroad hoAV, Avhen his friends had gone 
to make -a special plea for him to be left at liberty 
on parole, as it Avere, until the regular fall term of 
the court, he had priA^ately dispatched a messenger 
for the Sheriff and given himself into custody. 

There Avas the old, revived romance connecting 
the name of the prisoner Avith Leonard Glen’s hand- 


276 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


some sister, whom the gossips had freshly given to 
the new doctor for a possible bride. 

There was the foundationless but universally-ac- 
cepted addenda to this love-episode of the pretty 
girl from Virginia who had come all the w^ay from 
her distant home to stand by Hugh Maury, to whom 
she had pledged herself in marriage as soon as the 
demands of justice were satisfied. 

There was the dramatic feature of George Be- 
mish’s sudden reappearance under his father’s roof — 
coming from whence no one could surmise, but 
brin^ino: back with him that debonnaire fascination 
of face and manner that had made him irresistible 
to men and women in those by-gone days to which 
all Hawkspoint seemed to be returning. 

There was the thrilling feature of his absolute de- 
votion to the person and the cause of the man for 
Avhose crime he had been suffering these four years. 
There was something magnanimously fine in it that 
tended the universal heart to outspoken appreciation. 

There Avas the whispered report that Miss Glen 
and the young lady from Virginia were to be in 
attendance at the trial. Why, no one could divine ; 
but the bare possibility of such a novel spectacle as 
fair women within the precincts of Hawspoint’s 
dingy court-room served to swell the croAvd im- 
measurably. Oh, yes, there Avas abundant cause for 
the croAAMing of HaAA^kspoint’s Court-house that 
August morning. 

There Avere those who said, snarlingly, that a 
criminal Avith less influential friends than the Glens 
and the Bemishes and Doctor Murray Avould have 


A STEA^^GE PILGRIMAGE. ‘ 277 

been compelled to await the regular fall term of 
court, biding his time in the same miserable, illy- 
ventilated jail-room wherein George Bemish had lain 
for a month, until he had succeeded in releasing him- 
self one dark night. 

There were others — =those who knew best — who 
said that if Hugh Maury were kept incarcerated 
through the entire sultry summer there would be 
no prisoner to plead guilty or not guilty before any 
earthly tribunal. His powers of physical endurance 
were on the wane. 

There was a notable array of turn-outs ” grouped 
about under the trees in front of the Court-house 
that morning. The very earliest comers had the 
satisfaction of seeing these fine vehicles unloaded 
before they were driven off for shelter under the 
trees whose dust-laden leaves hung motionless under 
the coppery skies. 

Mr. Leonard Glen and three closely-veiled ladies 
had come in the open barouche whose splendid 
dapple greys, freed from the carriage-pole, were 
scornfully snifiing the burnt grass under their 
pampered noses. One of the three ladies whom the 
clerk of the court obsequiously showed to seats 
inside the railed space sacred to the Bar was small, 
and was dressed in deep mourning. The oldest 
Hawkspointer could not remember having ever seen 
her ; the youngest villager immediately announced 
that Hugh Maury’s affianced bride was already in 
the court-room. 

Doctor Bemish, leaning heavily on George’s arm, 
had appeared in person, much to the surprise of 


m 


A STBANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


every one, he having been invisible to his old con- 
stituents for so long. He looked worn and aged as 
he clambered laboriously down from his buggy, but 
there was a placid light on his benevolent face that 
was good to see. 

Close behind the Bemish buggy had come Doctor 
Murray’s drag, the toniest turn-out in all the coun- 
try-side. On the back seat of the drag was a figure 
which excited universal attention and some furtive 
smiles. It was an ancient dame, whose high-piled, 
comical bandana turban flashed its gay plaids into 
the eyes of the spectators, in sharp contrast with the 
weazened black face beneath it. 

Springing lightly from the drag, the doctor had 
given both hands to the ancient dame and almost 
lifted her from the vehicle. Side by side with the 
withered old negress the broad-shouldered, stalwart 
young doctor, whom everybody knew and liked by 
this time, entered the Court-house, and were shown to 
seats alongside the Glens and Bemishes inside the 
railing. 

After them the herd ! They were all there, gentle 
and simple — the well-wisher of this repentant evil- 
doer and the blatant clamorer for that sort of 
justice which demands an eye for an eye, a life for a 
life — when the Sheriff and his deputy came through 
a side-door, walking slowly, to accommodate their 
steps to those of the prisoner. Between them, lean- 
ing heavily on his polished crutches, but with his 
handsome head held well up, with a look of perfect 
peace pervading every feature of his marred visage, 
Huirh Maury walked. 


A STJiAJV&£! PlZOmMAO^M. 


279 


There ^as a confused murmur in the Court-house ; 
a buzz of commingled surprise, pity and incredulity ! 
More than one indignant denial of the once hand- 
some young Creole’s identity passed from lip to lip. 
That Hugh Maury? Hever! ISTothing on earth 
could have changed him to such an extent ! When 
the first dull thud of his wooden crutches fell upon 
the stillness of the court-room, a small, black-gloved 
hand went out convulsively toward Theresa Glen. 

She took it between both her own and held it 
there. There was not even a perceptible tremor in 
her own frame ; she had screwed her courage up to 
this ordeal ; she would not relax the tension by one 
thread. She was there to stand loyally by the man 
who had been involved in all this woe and shame for 
her sake. She was ready, if the occasion demanded, 
to stand up before all these people and repeat the 
vile insult which had cost that intoxicated French- 
man his life. 

Among them all they had failed in preventing her 
coming there that day. George Bemish, the old 
doctor and Archibald Murray — he whose lightest 
word she would gladly have made the law of her 
life — failed in moving her from her firmly-expressed 
resolution to be present at this trial. 

There was some slight commotion when the 
prisoner reached the seat assigned him. The Sheriff 
and his deputy withdrew from his side to give place 
to the Bemish es, father and son, who ranged them- 
selves on either side of the accused. 

In a voice not quite firm, the clerk of the court 
commanded the prisoner to stand. By the aid of 


^ SmANOE PILGRIMAGE. 

George’s firm hand the cripple ivas sooi poised upon 
his crutches. Then, in the dreary verb age of the 
law, the indictment in the case of the State of 
Louisiana versus Hugh Maury was set forth in pro- 
lix terms. The prisoner stood with his head held 
slightly bent, listening. He knew that somewhere 
near him was the State’s Attorney, whose solemn 
duty it was to bend every energy for the convic- 
tion of his maimed and broken body. He knew 
that somewhere before him were seated twelve 
men, whose solemn duty it was to divest them- 
selves of all personal bias in this grave juncture. 
Could Ben McBride, their foreman, do that? He 
knew that somewhere near him — close enough for 
him to touch them, perhaps, if he had put out his 
hand — were Hetty (dear, faithful little friend !) and 
Theresa, who had not shrunk from seeing him pass 
through this ordeal, and old Lucy, his most abject 
and devoted slave ; but it was not of them he Avas 
thinking. His entire attention Avas riveted upon the 
clerk of the court, as he solemnly intoned (so his im- 
patient soul called it) the indictment. At its close 
he stood indicted for murder. 

, There Avas an ominous stillness, a profound hush, 
in the court-room when this mere prologue to the 
drama they Avere all assembled to Avitness came to a 
close. There was, too, an ominous hush outside. 
The coppery August skies had suddenly become 
overcast Avith masses of black, flying clouds, that 
scudded athwart the hot sunshine. The song-birds 
in the dusty tree-tops twittered in low, frightened 
tones. Forks of lightning darted earthward from 


A STBANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


281 


the high-piled clouds, followed swifth^ by one awful 
burst of sound, as of a huge cannon discharged 
without premeditation. It smote startlingly upon 
the air. The tethered beasts snorted with terror. 
The loose window-sash of the court-room rattled un- 
der the shock. Theresa Glen passed a protecting 
arm around Hetty’s trembling form. There was a 
moment of profound stillness. Then the Judge, in a 
voice made puny by that awful trump of sound from 
on high, was heard saying : 

“ What has the counsel for the defense to say 

Hugh Maury, turning his sightless eyes in the 
direction of the Judge’s bench, answered in a clear, 
firm voice : 

May it please your Honor, there is no counsel 
for the defense !” 

^‘What, then, has the prisoner to answer for 
himself?” the Judge resumed, in an official mono- 
tone. “ Is he guilty or not guilty of the crime of 
murder, as charged in the indictment of the State 
against Hugh Maury, just heard of all these 
present ?” 

Hot guilty !” 

The words fell unfalteringly from the lips of the 
prisoner. Hot even by an added shade of pallor did 
his face bear witness to the awful tumult of his soul. 
Hever, even in the first moment of his keen remorse 
and terror over the passionate deed that had been 
his undoing had he suffered more. There was a 
murmur of surprise among the auditors. 

The Judge told him to be seated. He sank 
gratefully into the vacant chair between Poctor 


282 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


Bemish and George. With his hands resting upon 
the cross-piece of his crutches, he listened unmoved 
while the State’s Attorney set forth, with ghastly 
precision, all the details of the finding of Adrien 
Michelet’s dead body, all the bits of circumstantial 
evidence that had led to the imprisonment of the 
wrong man, and all the dastardliness of this murder 
of a friendless foreigner, with lurid vehemence. It 
was his duty to convict. 

At its close, Hugh Maury arose voluntarily. 

‘‘ I arise,” he said, slowly and impressively, stand- 
ing with his unseeing eyes turned respectfully to- 
ward the Judge on the bench, ‘Ho make my state- 
ment in the cause of law and justice.” 

Again that awful trump of sound from the cloud- 
capped sky. Then the summer thunder-storm was 
upon them in all its fury. Peal after peal of awful 
thunder followed quickly on the dancing, leaping, 
darting forks of lightning with crashes which made 
strong men start nervously and the little group of 
women in the court-room to turn pale with appre- 
hension. In the midst of this uproar Hugh Maury 
entered upon his public confession : 

“ As the indictment stands, your Honor, T am 
charged with having, on the sixteenth day of May, 
in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred 
and fifty-six, willfully and with malice aforethought 
murdered one Adrien Michelet, on the premises of 
Doctor Henry Bemish, in this parish. 

“To that charge of murder, your Honor, I plead 
not guilty. But for the woe and suffering I have 
wittingly and unwittingly inflicted on others some 


A SmANGE PILGRIMAGE!, 


m 


punisliment should be meted out to me, and it shall 
be left to the judgment of the gentlemen of the 
jury, who have been impaneled for this occasion, to 
decide what iny sentence shall be after I have told 
the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 
truth, about the killing of Adrien Michelet on the 
sixteenth day of May, in the year of our Lord one 
thousand eight hundred and fifty-six. 

For the pain my statement must necessarily give 
to some present, I ask their pardon in advance.” He 
bent his head slightly in the direction of the spot 
where Theresa Glen sat holding fast to Hetty’s 
little hand. But my explanation must be full and 
entire. 

“ On that day, may it please your Honor, a num- 
ber of the young people of this neighborhood had 
met together, for a day of merry-making and fishing, 
on the banks of the bayou that runs through the 
Bemish place. Among the other young people as- 
sembled there was the unfortunate Adrien Michelet, 
a Hew Orleans Creole whom Doctor Bemish had en- 
gaged as companion or tutor for his son, George Be- 
mish. If Adrien Michelet’s character was under 
discussion, I think there are those present who 
Avould bear me out in saying that he was at all 
times given to a certain freedom of speech and man- 
ner to ladies which filled every true man with dis- 
gust and indignation. 

“ I was on the committee of refreshments at that 
entertainment in the woods, and, returning from a 
distant grove which we had selected for the table 
arrangements, I came suddenly upon the lady whom 


m 


A STiiAmB PlLGitlMAQJB!. 


I had had the honor of escorting to the fish-fry, 
walking rapidly toward me, closely followed by 
Adrien Michelet, whose impudent assurance was 
quelled at sight of me hearing wrathfully down 
upon him. 

Some one caught my arm and begged me not to 
break up the whole thing by a row. It was George 
Bemish. 

“ I told him it was hard to keep my hands off the 
scoundrel. He answered, ‘ Leave him to me !’ I 
believe those words of his were fatally used against 
him later on. All that he meant by them he imme- 
diately put into execution by ordering the French- 
man to return to the house and not appear among 
his guests again that day — an order which the tutor 
obeyed, scowling savagely at me as he turned 
away. 

It was perhaps four hours after that that I was 
driving rapidly along Doctor Bemish’s lane, talcing 
home from the fish-fry the young lady whom Mich- 
elet had annoyed. The sun had been below the 
tree-tops long enough for dark shadows to lie along 
the hedging that lined the lane. As I drove along, 
Adrien Michelet sprang from among the shadows 
with a mocking, insulting laugh. The horse shied, 
and with a jump carried the buggy so far beyond 
the spot where Michelet stood that he was left out 
of sight. 

The whole thing was so sudden, and the lady’s 
fright at the plunge the horse made centered her 
attention so exclusively on her own danger, that she 
did not see what I saw — a piece of blue ribbon held 




tauntingly aloft by the Frenchman. I had missed 
the bow from her neck and knew it belong to 
her. 

I could not drive on and leave that trophy in his 
possession, knowing him capable of making false, 
coarse boasts. Perhaps your Honor will say I 
might have waited. I did not. I was out of the 
buggy, with some mumbled excuse about having 
dropped a glove. I am glad my horse carried the 
buggy so far that day that by the time I got back 
to Michelet the vehicle and its inmate were not to 
be seen. 

“ I tried to ask for that bit of blue ribbon without 
showing the fury that was blinding me. He told 
me, with a devilish laugh, that it had been given- to 
him. I told him that he lied. In a moment his 
knife was at my heart, and it was only a question as 
to w^hich one of us should strike first. The lot fell 
to me. I left him there, not knowing, not caring 
then, whether he was dead or alive. 

I had come off victor — the bow of blue ribbon 
was in my pocket. I hurried back to the buggy. 
My blood was in such a feverish tumult that I do 
not think I realized at all what I had done until I 
saw the horror of it reflected in other eyes. 

“I left the neighborhood that night — flying as 
men will try to fly from their own consciences and 
the results of their own evil deeds. I think it never 
once occurred to me that my rash deed could be laid 
at another man’s door. When I had been away a 
month, or perhaps longer, I ventured to write to a 
trusted friend, who was of the opinion that I had 


^86 


A PlLGllUrlAa^. 


been called away to the sick-bed of a near relative. 
I told him to write me of everything that had hap- 
pened in the neighborhood since my departure. 

He answered very promptly. He told me of the 
finding of Adrien Michelet’s body in Doctor Be- 
mish’s lane ; of George Bemish’s arrest on suspicion 
of the murder ; of his subsequent escape from jail 
and departure from the neighborhood ; of his old 
father’s crushed and despairing condition. 

‘‘ It was then, may it please your Honor, that con- 
science plied her scorpion-lash most fiercely. George 
Bemish had been my best-beloved friend through all 
my brotherless, sisterless boyhood! George Be- 
mish’s father had been friend, father and mother, all 
in one, to me. That they should be the selected vic- 
tims for my crime seemed a refined cruelty on the 
part of fate. 

“ I wrote to my friend to learn, if possible, in 
what direction George Bemish had fled. Following 
the clew he sent me in reply, I began a pilgrimage 
in search of the friend to whom I meant to confess 
the truth and to bring home in triumph to his 
father. God, in his infinite wisdom, however,- or- 
dained otherwise. 

M hen, a few months ago, your Honor, I found 
myself the distorted and helpless thing I am to-day, 
and knew that I could no longer pursue my search 
for George Bemish, I turned my steps this way, 
meaning to do all that it seemed I was to be per- 
mitted to do, and that was to relieve this, my friend, 
from the foul suspicion that wrongfully attached to 
his name, and to put myself into the hands of the 


A BTBANGE PILGRIMAGE. 387 

law, to be dealt with according to the judgment of 
my peers. 

I have done both — the case is in your hands.” 

He sat down exhausted, and for a moment his 
heavy breathing could be heard by those nearest 
him. 

The storm was still raging. The rain was dashing 
against the closed sash in blinding sheets. It was 
only when Hugh Maury stopped speaking that any 
one thought of the uproar outside. 

All eyes were turned upon the State’s Attor- 
ney. What step would he take next ? Before the 
State’s official had time to answer that question to 
himself Doctor Bemish arose slowly to his feet. 

He was an impressive figure, standing there with 
his silvery locks uncovered, one hand resting on 
Hugh Maury’s shoulder, while with the other he 
motioned to be heard. He was a man whom all the 
country-side had delighted to honor in the days of 
his useful and beneficent reign as the doctor. 

May it please your Honor, and you, my friends, 
who have come here for the sensation of this thing, 
I should like to announce myself as a witness for the 
defense. May I go on ?” This with his fine blue 
eyes raised to the Judge, who responded by a low- 
spoken Y es.” He was afraid, stern official as he 
was, to trust his voice with a longer answer. 

By the laws of compensation,” the old man went 
on in his low, gentle voice, the voice that had in the 
days gone by brought cheer and comfort to many a 
sick and suffering one among his listeners, this our 
fellow-sinner deserves to be dealt by very leniently. 


288 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


The very elements are in a tumult over this scene of 
man’s retributive judgment. I, the man who above 
all others have suffered most from that rash deed 
with this single grave exception,” laying his fatherly 
hand upon Hugh’s wavy brown hair, ‘^desire to 
plead his cause. Through him, I was bereft of son, 
good name and peace of mind at one blow ! Through 
him, I was left to battle against suspicion and cold- 
ness and aversion, where always friendly greetings 
had been mine. Through him the son of my loins, 
the one joy and comfort of my life, lay hidden like a 
hunted animal for four bitter years. Through him 
I was doomed to spend my declining years in such 
bitterness of spirit, in such dreary loneliness, that I 
have been tempted over and over again, my friends, 
to curse God and die ! And yet I am proud this 
day to call Hugh Maury my friend. 

“ Look at him, your Honor; look at him well ! Look 
at the wooden crutches which so poorly supply the 
place of a young man’s strong, swift limbs ! Look 
at the scarred lids which shield his sightless eyes ! 
Does he need any counsel for the defense ? Has not 
the God of infinite justice traced His own verdict 
indehbly upon the poor maimed form of this man 
whom I honor myself in calling my friend ? What 
can your laws, or your lawyers, or your jury of his 
peers take from him that would rob his life of one 
single joy? His peers!” The old man turned 
abruptly upon the twelve jurymen in the box. 
“ Are you his peers ? Is there one among you all 
who would have periled his life in the fierce flames 
of a burning building to rescue, not a fair, young 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


289 


heroine of romance, but a poor, old, liumble slave, 
whom every one else had forgotten ? Is there one 
among you all who, having in a moment of hot 
wrath taken the life of a fellow-creature, would have 
consumed your years and your substance to free 
another man’s name from suspicion — that, too, when 
justice slumbered or had forgotten you ? If there is 
such a one among you, gentlemen, then you are his 
peer, and I honor you in admitting it.” 

The State’s Attorney turned from this old man 
eloquent as he ceased speaking, to address himself to 
the jury. There was a commotion among the group 
of women sitting within the rail. George Bemish 
and Archibald Murray sprang forward simultane- 
ously. It was George Bemish who reached the 
group first, and lifting Theresa’s limp form in his 
arms, bore her swiftly through the crowd into the 
fresh, rain-washed air, followed closely by Archie 
and Mrs. Glen. 

A few moments of suspense ! Then there fioated 
out to them on the little balcony to which they had 
carried the fainting girl a murmur of applause 
wTiich svv^elled into an excited, triumphant cry ! The 
crowd came surging from the open doors. 

“ What is it ? hYhat are they saying ?” Theresa 
asked, opening her eyes and looking into the first 
pair of eyes that met hers. They were ghstening 
with tears ! — those great, luminous eyes of George 
Bemish’s. 

‘Mt is a nolle os . he answered, wishing from 
his heart that she had not chosen that critical mo- 
ment to give way in. He wanted to be in there 


290 


A STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 


where the men were weaving their arms together 
into a triumphal car for Hugh Maury, and where his 
old father was sitting sobbing like a hysterical girl, 
and where the Judge and the State’s Attorney and 
the twelve jurymen were all either searching for 
their pocket-handkerchiefs or furtively stuffing 
them back into their side pockets, and where Hetty 
Ogden, that demure-faced, dove-eyed little Virginian 
who in the last few weeks had come to enter so 
largely into his calculations for the future, was 
hovering about his father in that angelically con- 
solatory fashion which is given to but few women 
and no man. 


A niQmMAGM;, 


m 


CHAPTEE XXIY. 

HETTY STRAIGHTENS OUT THE SNARL. 

T O FEEL that fate has clone its very worst; 

that there is no longer any call to gird up 
one’s loins to resistance ; to know that malice has 
not a single poisoned dart left in its quiver ; to glide 
monotonously through the hours that bring with 
them nothing to shock or to startle the tired pulse, 
sometimes brings a feeling akin to happiness to souls 
that have been storm-tossed. 

Theresa Glen, swinging lazily in a low-swung 
hammock, out under the clear blue October skies, 
reasoned thus to herself, and fancied for the moment 
that she was enunciating a great moral axiom 
which time had left for her to formulate. 

She imagined she had conquered every rebellious 
fiber of her moral being. In reality she was simply 
extremely weak from the severe tension of mind 
and body under which she had labored so long, and 
was too tired to think, almost too tired to feel. To 
her this lull was the death of passion. 

Through the swaying branches of the glossy-leaved 
magnolia grandiflora, into whose bark was driven 
the ring and staple that supported one end of her 
hammock, she could catch glimpses of bright blue 
sky-patches ; through the nodding, waving rose- 
bushes that were swinging their heavily-burdened 


292 


A STHAmB PILGmMA.GE. 


branches restlessly under the cool evening breeze 
she could see the lake — dimpled and rumpled and 
blue; Paul’s tame poulter-pigeons were strutting 
and cooing softly on the grass all about her feet. 
Paul had been there in the hammock with her up to 
a little while ago. The largest crumbs he had scat- 
tered to his pets were not all consumed yet. He had 
been chattering to her in a sweet, childish treble 
about his bo}^ hopes and desires. 

She liked to have Paul with her. He rested her. 
He belonged to the future, and his childish prattle 
was all of the things that were going to happen to 
him or be done by him in the great untried to come. 
More and more she tried to merge every interest of 
her own life — such a poor, marred life as it had 
proven to be, she thought, with infinite sadness — into 
the fresh, springing, joyous hopes and fancies of the 
boy who had just gone away from her, singing and 
caroling like a lark. Paul’s future should be her 
future ! J^o one could rob her of that pure joy ! 

A faint metallic click caused her to turn her eyes 
in the direction of the front gate. Hetty Ogden 
had just come through it, walking quickly, with her 
little hands clasped about an immense bunch of 
golden-rod, above whose yellow plumes her sweet, 
flushed face could just be seen. 

She was glad that the sight of the girl’s bright, 
sweet face had come to be really pleasant to her. 
She ranked her affection for Hetty among her 
achievements. It was a sure sign, she told herself, 
that she was entirely and forever cured 6f that 
transitory wealmess for Hetty’s cousin. She was 


A STRAm^ pilgrtmagm. 


m 


glad sli6 could feel so lazily comfortable in her 
swinging nest in spite of the fact that Hetty had 
just parted from Archibald Hurray at the front 
gate after a long drive, which had kept them away 
from the house fully an hour and sent the child 
back to her with glowing cheeks and dancing eyes. 

“ May I sit in one end ?” she asked, untying her 
hat-strings as she neared the hammock, and pushing 
the damp rings of hair back from her forehead. 

‘‘Certainly,” said Theresa, drawing her skirts a 
little closer about her ankles ; “ on one condition.” 

“And that is?” Hetty asked, preparing to appro- 
priate her allowance of the hammock. 

“ That you don’t swing, and that you do all the 
talking. Swinging always makes me giddy, unless 
I can regulate the motion, and I am afaid I am lazy 
this afternoon.” 

Hetty laughed luxuriously as she curled up in a 
knot, and with her clasped hands under her head 
answered : 

“ I call that two conditions. I want to do all the 
talking, however, this time. Miss Thersie. I have 
something to tell you. I want your advice in a very 
important matter.” 

She laid her offering of golden-rod in Theresa’s 
lap. 

“Very important, pretty one?” 

“Very — nothing less than the selection of a 
home !” she said, in a demure voice. 

Theresa was silent. Hetty laughed musically. 

“ Did you ever hear of a girl having three offers 
in one day ?” she asked, opening her eyes very wide 


S04 


A PILOniMAGW. 


to emphasize the magnitude of this announce- 
ment. 

“ Three offers ? From ” 

Theresa’s voice was peculiarly distant. She had 
never seen any approach to vulgarity in Doctor 
Murray’s pretty cousin. She hoped none was about 
to develop on the strength of these conquests. 

“Three offers from three gentlemen — one, two, 
three!” said Hetty, saucily, counting them off on 
her fingers. “ And all so equally eligible that with- 
out your advice, dear Miss Thersie, I am quite sure 
I shall make a wrong choice, and that would be 
fatal, you know.” 

“Then you have no individual preferences by 
which to guide yourself in this grave decision?” 
Theresa said, frigidly. There were limits to her 
powers of endurance, she began to suspect, angrily. 

Hetty laughed a little, low, almost insolent laugh, 
and looked at her a second fixedly. It angered 
Theresa still more to find herself flushing and paling 
under the steady gaze of the girl’s great, clear gray 
eyes. Such a child as she was, too ! 

“ Oh, yes, I have !” said Hetty, mercifully turning 
her eyes away and fixing them on a patch of blue 
sky immediately over her head. “I have a very 
decided preference ; but one’s preferences are not 
always the best guides, are they, in matters of this 
sort ?” 

“Hot always,” said Theresa. “But suppose you 
tell me all about your conquests ?” 

“ Conquests ?” 

“ Offers, then, and I can advise better.” 


A sTRAi^a^E! pilgrimage:. 


295 


Instead of answering immediately, Hetty struck 
the grass beneath the hammock sharply with the 
toe of one little boot. The poulter-pigeons fluttered 
clumsily out of her reach. The hammock swung 
briskly. Theresa turned deathly white. 

Oh, what a wretch ! You told me not to swing ! 
You are as pale as death ! I’ll get right up and tell 
my story on my knees ! That’s where I ought to be 
in your presence !” 

“You’ll do nothing of the sort, you ridiculous 
child,” Theresa said, putting out a detaining hand. 

“I was trying to get this letter out of my 
pocket,” Hetty said, remorsefully, “ and pockets are 
so hard to get into nowadays. You are pale 
yet.” 

“ Hever mind me. If you have anything to tell me, 
do it at once, Hetty. I dare not stay out after the 
dew begins to fall. I am getting to be a rickety 
old maid.” 

“Yes — hum! "Well, my first offer comes from 
poor old Mr. John Rose.” 

“ The brother of the crazy woman who made so 
much trouble for your cousin ?” 

“The very same. But Mr. Rose himself is a 
saint.” 

“ Rather an old saint for you, isn’t he, Hetty ?” 

“ Old — for me ? Oh, oh, dear 1” 

The hammock swung again. This time involun- 
tarily. Hetty’s irrepressible laugh rang clear as a 
bell upon the quiet air. 

“ Dear, dear Miss Thersie, what a goose you must 
take me for 1” 




A ^TUAmE PILOniMAGE. 


only for a very happy girl. I love to hear 
you laugh.” 

“ Poor old Mr. John ! He writes to tell me that, 
as I was staying here so much longer than I had at 
first planned to do, it had occurred to him that per- 
haps I was in some doubts as to where to make ’my 
future home. He writes that poor Miss Parmelie is 
dead — ‘at rest,’ he calls it — and that if I will come 
with the boys and take up my home there, he will 
be a father to us all. Isn’t he good 
. “ Yery. But you don’t want. to go ?” 

“ I am going to do just whatever you advise me 
to do. Just now, when Cousin Archie was putting 
me out at the gate, he told me to go to you for ad- 
vice. He said I never could go to a sweeter or 
wiser woman.” 

“ Thanks — both to you and your cousin. I only 
wish I deserved such exalted commendation,” said 
Theresa, with a ring of irony in her cool tones. 

“ M}^ second offer comes from Doctor Bemish and 
is dreadfully like the first. You know Mr. Bemish 
wants to take Mr. Maury to Europe. He says a sea 
voyage will quite set him up.” 

Of course Theresa knew it. Since the day of 
Hugh Maury’s acquittal George Bemish had been a 
very constant visitor at Glencove. 

“ To see Theresa,” Archibald Murra}^ said bitterly 
to himself. 

“To see the girl who is already affianced to her 
cousin,” Theresa said, as bitterly to herself. 

“ To see that dove-eyed girl, who, when her year 
of mourning is expired, I will woo as never man 


A STRANOE PILGRIMAGE. ^97 

wooed maiden before,” George Bemish said to him- 
self. 

Hetty alone saw nothing but a very pleasant 
break in the long, quiet days, in having handsome 
George Bemish row across the lake to play croquet, 
or to take her out upon the water, or to sit by her as 
she prattled as she never had prattled since the days 
before she had helped ‘‘ defraud her cousin.” 

Of course the Glens knew all about his plans for 
Hugh Maury. 

“ I don’t doubt it would be beneficial, but he 
seems very happy with the Bemishes,” she quietly 
answered. 

Yes, happier than I ever saw him in Yirginia. 
Well, Doctor Bemish wants mo to come and keep 
house for him while Mr. Bemish and Mr. Maury are 
ill Europe.” 

“ And you would like that ?” 

Immensely, if nothing better offered. You 
know I simply adore Doctor Bemish. He makes me 
feel like a bird in a soft, warm nest.” 

Then something better has offered ?” 

“ Yes ; Cousin Archie wants me to make a home 
for him,” Hetty said simply. 

The shades of evening were falling fast. From 
beneath the hand she had put up to arrange the 
short curls over her forehead she watched Theresa 
Glen furtively. Her quick ear caught the gasping 
breath, her keen eyes the white-drawn pain in the 
lovely face opposite her. It was Theresa who 
presently broke the silence. 

That, then, would make you entirely happy ?” 


^98 -4 STRANGE PILGRIMAGE. 

“ I am not so sure. That arrangement, too, would 
have its drawbacks.” 

Drawbacks !” 

‘‘Yes. Cousin Archie might get married, and 
then where would I be ?” 

“ Married ! But — I thought ” 

Hetty was out of the hammock now, and kneeling 
down close by Theresa, she flung her arms about her 
neck, kissing her tumultuously. 

“Yes, married! What would I do when — oh, 
Thersie, don’t let us all go on playing at cross-pur- 
poses any longer. I told Cousin Archie to drive 
back this way after he had seen about old Mrs. 
Matthews’ ‘bad leg,’ and I would tell him what 
you advised me to do. I see him getting out of the' 
buggy now. He needs some one to make a home 
for him, sweet lady, but it is not Hetty. ISTot poor, 
little, ridiculous, childish Hetty, to whom he never 
gave a thought of that sort. Do you suppose 
I have been blind?” A shower of kisses fell on 
Theresa’s lips, eyes and ears. The next moment she 
was alone — alone and trying to hush the wild 
throbbing of a heart which only half an hour 
before she had pronounced as well-regulated as a 
first-class chronometer. She knew Hetty had rushed 
away after that storm of kisses, leaving her white 
dress, the hammock and the grass strewn with the 
yellow plumes she had been at so much pains to cull 
from the golden-rod along the route of her drive. 

She heard some one breathing near her. She 
would not open her eyes. Some one took the hands 
that she had pressed to their quivering lids and 


A sti^a:^^ou pilgrimage. 


299 


softly removed them. Some one knelt by her side. 
She opened her eyes in obedience to a subtle power 
she could no longer resist. For a second she gazed 
mutely in Archibald Murray’s eyes. Then in a slow, 
sweet, far-away voice slie said to him : 

“ Once before I opened my eyes to find you kneel- 
ing just so by my side. Then, as now, you took my 
hands and held them tenderly. You called yourself 
my ” 

“ Lover !” he said, taking the words from her lips. 
“ blow, as then, I love you. Now as then, I would 
give all that the world holds to call you mine. 
Hetty sent me here. My wise, sweet little cousin, 
who claims to be able to read the hearts of men and 
maidens. Hetty promised me you would not repulse 
me. 

‘‘ She says I "am all astray in thinking that any 
one has a better right to speak to you this way than 
I have ” 

“ Hugh Maury ! Oh, no, no ! He — we — I was 
very young, and ” 

‘‘Not Hugh Maury — George Bemish. Has he 
not haunted Glencove ever since his reappearance 

“ Hetty is here !” said Theresa, with a smile of 
such radiance that all his doubts and fears melted 
before it like snow under a noonday sun. 

“ And you — oh, -Theresa ’’ 

He stretched out his arms imploringly. 

“ I am yours — ^yours in very truth. Oh, my love, 
where else have I been since first fate brought us 
face to face ?” 

Hetty, coming out upon the gallery refreshed and 


A STMAiSTGE PILGRIMAGR 


Soo 

redressed after her drive, heard a murmur of voices 
out there in the hammock which made her smile as 
she said, a little wistfully : 

Dear, dear old Archie ! Have I not more than 
compensated for driving him from his home 
Raising her voice she said, in mocking tones that 
reached the hammock with clearness : 

“ ‘ If you have anything to tell me, do it at once, 
Hetty. I dare not stay out after the dew begins to 
fall. I am getting to be a rickety old maid.’ ” 

Theresa laughed, and giving both hands to Doctor 
Murray, rose from the hammock and walked sub- 
missively toward the spot where the laughing girl 
stood waiting for them. 

Ho, he would not go in, Archibald said ; he would 
only wait for Hetty to tell him what answer he 
must carry back to Doctor Bemish that evening, he 
having been the old gentleman’s ambassador. 

“ Tell him,” said Hetty, ‘hthat I am going back to 
Virginia to keep house for poor old Mr. John Rose. 
Tell him, though, that I love him, dear old doctor, 
just like a father.” 

It was George Bemish who crossed th^ lake that 
same evening and persuaded Hetty to go out with 
him under the full flood of moonlight, which she de- 
clared afterward was entirely responsible for her 
sudden change of programme, and used such persua- 
sive arguments that on her way to her own room, 
after he had left her, she stopped at Theresa’s door 
and opened it just wide enough to say, in a hissing 
whisper : 

Thersie, I have changed my mind 1” 


A SmAA'GB PILGRIMAGE. 


301 


‘‘Yes?” 

“ I am going to keep house for Doctor Bemish.” 

“ Until when ?” 

“ Until Geo — until Mr. Bemish and Mr. Maury 
get back from Europe.” 

“ And then V 

“ We will all keep house together,” she said, with 
a clear, low laugh, that ran like a thread of sweet 
music through Theresa Glen’s happy reveries that 
night. 


THE END. 


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